


Chasing Down Silver Linings (We Are Coming Home)

by aeveee, magicalzebra, scryves



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-16
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-03-18 03:05:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 53,291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3553724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeveee/pseuds/aeveee, https://archiveofourown.org/users/magicalzebra/pseuds/magicalzebra, https://archiveofourown.org/users/scryves/pseuds/scryves
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It starts with a drawing and ends with years' worth of letters and a hope Clarke never asked for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. burn our bridges ('til we drown)

**Author's Note:**

> (Or: a Canadian and a British Australian write an American college AU.)
> 
> Title taken from ‘Home II’ by Dotan. What started as ‘college penpal au’ and has clearly gotten out of control. 
> 
> Warning: Deals with recent character death.
> 
> Acknowledgements: Major thanks to magicalzebra for her artistic talent (please please _please_ [credit her](http://magicalzebra.tumblr.com) if you want to show anyone her artwork), Monet (who is not magicalzebra but lbr I know which art _I_ prefer), and dealanexmachina and S.H. for their beta-ing and idea contributions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title taken from 'Home' by Dotan.

_Dear Lexa,_

_Remember that time we were studying outside - I went to get a drink, and when I came back you’d put a tiny bunch of buttercups on my notes? You threw a twig at me after I called you a giant nerd. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I kept the twig - it’s sticking out the drawer of my desk. I thought it would make me laugh, but I keep finding myself staring at it like a sap instead. I think you’re rubbing off on me._

_Anyway, this was just supposed to be a note to remind you to please water my flowers, and eat something other than pizza while I’m gone. Remember what I said about vegetables? I’m leaving this in the drawer with the take out menus since I know you’d never come across it if I put it up on the fridge._

_I’ll be back after Mom’s birthday. Wish you were coming to celebrate with us, I’m sure Mom misses you. But don’t stress too much about your French exam - you’re amazing and you’ll ace it (you said baguette pretty nicely last night)._

_Your,_

_Kos_

_**_

The first thing Lexa finds after the accident are the right words to tell people: short words that give enough information to avoid the questions, but abstract enough to avoid the shock and the sympathy.

‘My girlfriend was in a car accident. She didn’t make it.’ Lexa has said it so many times that she feels untethered from its meaning, like she’s lost all hope of ever understanding the reality of it. People expect things of grief. If her reactions don’t fit into their dictionary definition, their concern and discomfort become exhausting. That’s her role now, to help people in her life feel comfortable around her - and apparently, that involves not saying things like, ‘My girlfriend was decapitated by a flatbed truck. Her head was in the backseat of her car, and there are pictures all over the internet because people are sick fucks, and I can’t _breathe_ anymore’.

She’s on her way back to her hotel from a meeting with the florist; a spray of purple and white for the coffin that she thinks everyone will like. There’s an obscene number of small, pointless, _awful_ decisions to be made when somebody dies. Closing bank accounts, providing proof of death, organising funerals, and the distraught family of her girlfriend are too -- ex girlfriend? Dead girlfriend. _My girlfriend was in a car accident_.

She can’t even bring herself to think her name.

Lexa stops, rests a hand on the brick wall and shudders. Her hair has slipped from the confines of her hat, but she lets it lie in the wind, loose and covering her face from the people passing her. It feels disrespectful, to keep calling her nothing but ‘her girlfriend’. Like their relationship was all she ever was. _Kostia_ , she thinks, purposefully. The name bites into unwelcome memories, but it’s a clean sort of pain that’s different to the all-over ache since it happened. She fingers the packet of cigarettes in the pocket of her coat - the green pea coat she wore on their first date because someone had once said it brought out her eyes and that seemed like something the girl with the easy smile in her class would like. There are other things of Kostia’s still in her apartment, but the cigarettes - the ones she used to mock her beautiful, environmentally conscious, otherwise health freak of a girlfriend about - she ran back to pick them up from her windowsill when Lincoln called, thinking dumbly that she would want them when she woke up.

She should go back to the hotel and try to sleep. She didn’t manage to get much last night, and the family don’t need her again until tomorrow’s meeting with the funeral director. Kostia’s brother is not an effusive kind of guy, but this morning Lincoln hugged her roughly and told her he didn’t know what they’d do without her. He looked over his shoulder at his mother, but Indra didn’t look up, steadily packing Kostia’s life into old cardboard boxes, things like ‘ _baby clothes_ ’ and ‘ _kids’ paintings_ ’ scrawled on the side from previous moves.

She should try to get to sleep, but the crap TV she was looking forward to using to mute her brain doesn’t seem like enough now.

She looks up at the street sign on the building across the road, squinting at it and hesitating, before turning and starting in another direction, fingers twisting the butt of a cigarette she’ll never smoke.

** 

_Raven,_

_I left some waffles for you; they’re on the plate under tin foil. Also, reminder: it’s your turn to make dinner tonight._

_I’m going to be at the MFA, text if you need me._

_Clarke_

**

Sometimes, Clarke wonders if anyone at the museum recognizes her. She has a routine - jog, shower, an attempt at a healthy breakfast, inevitable compromise for hash browns - before she settles down. The ticket people change every so often, but weekend staff is limited, and Clarke has been in frequently enough to know the rounds: there is an older gentleman who rarely asks for her pass, a younger one who tends to be too chatty. One boy who looks about high school age likes to smile at Clarke in a way that’s shy but also a little daring. Clarke makes a note to determine if he does this to all the girls who pass by.

Today, though, Clarke rushes through the ticket gate, pass held up hiding half of her smile. It’s rare that she has more than an hour to spare in her indulgence and no prior engagements threatening to disrupt. She thinks of the place she wants to settle into, warm with sunlight and the occasional wanderer, and her strides grow long and light. They falter when Clarke reaches her destination and finds it occupied.

When she was six, Clarke’s father brought her to the MFA and held her hand as they walked through exhibit after exhibit after exhibit. Abby had, at first, insisted that their daughter was too young to have the patience for what Jake had planned, but Jake had just laughed, pressed a kiss to his wife’s forehead and hoisted Clarke onto his hip, asking if his little girl was ready. Clarke had smiled wide - gap toothed, as the photo on the front steps will attest to - and promised her father she was.

They reached the Monet around mid-afternoon, Clarke’s eyes drooping from the satisfaction of macaroni and cheese for lunch and long hours exploring what seemed like an endless building. Jake had tugged her to a stop and knelt down, smiling indulgently as Clarke tried to blink herself awake. Later, Clarke would only remember the way her father’s face had lit up as he talked about the roll of the boat beneath his feet, the smell of open water and the heat of the sunlight reflecting onto his face. She vaguely recalls her mother describing sitting on the porch of a little coastal house but can’t quite remember what else she had said. Every time Clarke sees this painting, she only thinks of her father, of his smile and the warmth of his hand around hers as they both imagine a clear summer breeze billowing from the canvas.

The girl sitting in front of the painting now doesn’t seem to smell the sea or the sting of fresh grass. Her focus is instead on the cigarette packet she turns around slowly in her lap. Clarke settles onto the other end of the bench, pulling out her sketchbook and considering the wild curls of the girl’s hair, the way the light catches and disappears in them. Her pencil touches paper and she’s about to let her hand run when she catches the heaviness in the girl’s posture.

Clarke is feeling indulgent today, lifted by the floral scents the painting invokes in her and the prospect of an easy weekend. She can’t bring her pencil to bear the weight the girl seems to be sitting under. Instead, she finds an elderly couple leisurely strolling through the exhibit and begins scratching out the lines of their lazy Saturday morning. When the girl stands, Clarke is in the midst of sketching the way the couple’s hands are linked and pays no mind to the girl leaving.

**

_Dear Kostia,_

_I finally had time to call my college counsellor this morning. She told me I should try writing to you. I thought it was stupid, but she’s been good about helping me organize extensions on my class assignments, and I can’t sleep._

_Funeral arrangements are going okay. You would like what we’re doing, I hope. I was supposed to make a speech, but I have nothing to say that will make your mom or Lincoln feel any better._

_I stopped by to see that painting today - your stupid house by the sea that you wanted to take a trip to find, even though it is unlikely to exist anymore. Maybe we should have taken that summer for ourselves and tried anyway._

_Maybe I should have said yes more. Maybe I should have said something all those times you were looking more at me than the road. Maybe you should have been paying more fucking attention._

_This was about as stupid an idea as I thought it would be._

 ** 

 

 

_ [Image of Monet’s Fisherman’s Cottage on the Cliffs at Varengeville.]  _

**

**Subject:**  visit?  
**Date:**  Mon Oct 13, 2014 @ 5:48 AM  
**From:**  Abigail Griffin <abigail.griffin@mgh.harvard.edu>  
**To:**  Clarke Griffin <clarke.griffin@mit.edu>

Hi honey,

Sorry I missed your call yesterday, surgery ran long. I’m dropping by Callie’s sometime next week, maybe Tuesday afternoon. Do you have time for dinner? Stay warm.

I love you.

Mom

**Dr. Abigail Griffin **  
General Surgeon  
Harvard University  
Department of Medicine   


** 

A cancelled lecture one afternoon gives Clarke an unexpected few hours free, and she hesitates for only a moment before shooting a quick text to Raven, telling her she might be home late for dinner.

By the time she reaches the museum entrance, Clarke’s cheeks are a chilled pink and she spends a few minutes just inside the doors breathing on stiff fingers, mittens sticking out of her coat pocket. The old man at the ticket gate grins and waves her in. “The exhibits are a lot nicer than by the door, come on in before you freeze!”

Clarke huffs a soft laugh into her scarf as she slips past.

Usually on days where Clarke has only a half hour to spare, she’ll find a more popular exhibit to sit in, using the increased flow of people for a better pick of muses. With her schedule clear for hours yet, Clarke lets her feet take her to the quiet corner where the Monet hangs. She’s mildly surprised to find she recognizes the only other person in the exhibit.

The girl is wearing a too-large red jacket, still buttoned shut against a chill that doesn’t reach into the well-heated gallery. Her hair is loose and the thick curls are draped over one shoulder as she sits with her head tilted back, staring at the painting. Clarke follows the delicate lilt of her nose and lips, eyelashes long in profile. Distantly, she hears the sound of other people slowly entering the exhibit, but neither she nor the girl move and it’s almost an unconscious motion to pull out her sketchbook, to let the pencil hit paper and begin to carve out the lines of this girl.

Clarke doesn’t realize she has an audience until she’s just finishing the curve of the girl’s back and a voice calls over her shoulder:

“Wow, that is amazing. It looks just like her!”

Clarke startles, badly. She barely catches hold of her jittering pencil, swings around with wide eyes to face the man grinning behind her. When she looks back, the girl has turned to face them both, a pinched look on her face.

“I - ” Clarke starts. Her sketchbook rests open on her lap, the drawing clear for the girl to see. Clarke watches as the pinched look shifts to a flush and she swallows thickly. “I didn’t mean to - ”

The girl stares at the drawing for a moment longer before she meets Clarke’s embarrassed gaze, and the anger Clarke finds there makes her lean back in surprise. “What do you think you’re doing?”

Clarke flounders. She’s used to self-conscious smiles, curious questions, maybe a raised eyebrow, but she’s never been confronted with such direct anger before.

“Do you make it a habit to draw people without their permission?”

The man who had originally interrupted Clarke has started backing away, sheepish and eager to disappear. Clarke watches him go, wonders if he will get a verbal lashing too, but the girl pays him no mind and Clarke clutches at her sketchbook, unsure of how to proceed. For long moments, they stare at each other, Clarke flushed with embarrassment, the girl wire tight with anger. Finally, the girl breaks the silence.

“Give me the drawing.”

Clarke blinks. “What?”

“The drawing,” the girl repeats, gestures with a fist at the sketchbook Clarke instinctively pulls closer and covers with widespread hands, “Hand it over.”

“Why would you - ” Clarke shakes her head, tries again, “No. I mean, I’m sorry, but no.”

“No?” The girl is leaning forward now, eyes bright and harsh. The derisive note in her voice cuts at the space between them and Clarke resists the urge to shift away, an anger of her own starting to build. “I guess you’re fine with the concept of taking something that isn’t yours, then.”

Before Clarke can think to react, the girl has clawed the sketchbook from her lap and is crunching the edge of the page in angry fingers, paper starting to rip. Clarke’s own anger bursts at the sound, the shock and affront of someone having so little regard for her work and her belongings. She’s about to bite out something she thinks she’ll regret later when the girl suddenly stops, stares at the sketchbook in her hand and the way the page is hanging from the spine.

“Are you done?” Clarke asks after tense moments have passed. She wants to say more, wants to pry the girl’s fingers open until she releases the sketchbook, but something in the girl’s posture keeps her silent and she waits. When the girl finally looks at her, Clarke feels her tension seep away as though it was never there.

“Here,” the girl says. Clarke takes the sketchbook that the girl holds out, thrown by the sudden grief and self-loathing that weighs her voice down. “I wasn’t - ”

The girl never finishes. Clarke watches as she shifts in her coat, stands up and strides out of the room without looking back.

The page is still intact, but the book no longer closes properly because of the wrinkles.  Clarke thinks it an accurate representation of what she feels.

**

_Dear Kostia,_

_Your funeral is tomorrow, and today I almost attacked someone in a museum._

_I would kill for one more pacifist, hippy lecture from you._

_Fuck, I can’t do this._

**

The funeral is--

Lexa would like to never have to think about anything ever again.

**

Lexa’s check out time is ten, but her flight back to California isn’t until late that evening. The heavy rain starts to fall almost as soon as she settles on the park bench, and she fumbles to open an umbrella before her backpack soaks through.

She knows there are plenty of places indoors, plenty of other museums in Boston even, but none of the others help her feel as close to Kostia and she needs to, now, before she has to get on the plane and leave her here.

When she steps into the building, she looks at the security guard with a half-guilty flick of her eyes, almost expecting him to stop her and escort her back out. She passes unhindered, her tight grip on her purse relaxing as she makes her way over to the gift shop. The postcards are only a couple of dollars, and she thumbs through them until she finds the one she wants, paying for the small, tangible memory she can carry back to California with her.

The two extra days she took to rest in her hotel room - ordering take-out and flipping through channels with an unread textbook in front of her - did nothing to help the exhaustion, heavy and thick against her thoughts. She still has too many blank hours ahead of her, and she makes her way to the museum’s restaurant for the largest hit of caffeine she can find.

Her stomach jolts when she sees a familiar blonde standing in line ahead of her. She hesitates until the girl starts to order; then, she steps out of line and pushes towards her, taking some bills out of her wallet and pressing them down on the counter.

“Let me get that.”

She tries to gauge how her apology is being taken, but she can’t quite look at the girl as she says it, and she ends up just staring the barista down like she dares her to refuse, nudging her money at her until she takes it. “And a large black coffee,” she adds, because she may as well take the opportunity to cut in line while she has it.

The person she - well, sort of semi-attacked the other day - is looking at her warily when she turns from getting her change, her eyebrows raised in obvious question. “Can I help you?” she asks slowly.

Lexa bites back a wince and shrugs, the apology fitting uncomfortably on her. “I shouldn’t have - before.” The girl’s face softens; her coffee comes before Lexa’s, but she doesn't move towards the only available table until Lexa's drink is in her hands and she's turning to leave.

"You bought me a coffee," the girl stops her, gesturing towards the seats. "I can share a table."

Lexa hesitates, but her bag is heavy and it's not like she can take her coffee into the exhibit with her.

"Unless you're planning on damaging any more of my property?"

Lexa shakes her head, burning her tongue on a quick sip from her coffee as the girl smiles and turns like that’s the end of the subject. She follows the girl to the table, dropping her bag to the floor.

"I'm Clarke."

The introduction comes before she can take out her phone to pretend to be too busy for conversation. Clarke’s protective grip around the sketchbook held on her lap is the only thing that gets her to reply, with grudging politeness, "Lexa."

Her coffee is too hot to drink quickly, and Clarke is watching her with an unsettling intensity, like she's waiting for a further apology. Lexa just hunches over, blowing gently and letting the steam drifting upwards warm her face.

"So you really like Monet?" Clarke tries.

"No."

Clarke squints at her like she's deranged, nodding down at the print peeking out from the top of the paper gift bag still clutched in Lexa's hand. Lexa clears her throat.

"He's okay." She shifts as Clarke laughs quietly, and leans over to hide the postcard in between the covers of a textbook for the midterm she'd missed five days ago. When she sits back up, she shrugs around the sharp edge of her explanation. "Someone I knew liked that painting."

"Me too," Clarke says, after a pause. Lexa makes a noise of acknowledgement. It's supposed to be the opposite of a question, but Clarke seems to take it as one anyway. "My dad."

There's something wistful in her voice that has Lexa looking up at her properly for the first time. Her face is open, and there's an inward sadness shifting across it that echoes the ache Lexa feels.

They watch each other in a long, heavy moment of shared _something_ , and Lexa reaches for anything to break it. She may have made a spur of the moment decision to buy the girl a coffee, but she didn’t think she’d actually have to make conversation. “Are you studying art?”

“No,” Clarke says, and there’s a gentle sort of mocking in the way she imitates the clipped cadence of Lexa’s words, softened by her smile. “Developmental and human biology. You?”

“Politics and international relations,” Lexa says, and Clarke’s smile grows, but she doesn’t put into words what she finds amusing about it. That in itself is probably more diplomatic than Lexa would have been. Clarke takes a sip of her coffee, studies Lexa over the rim.

“Which college?”

“UC Berkeley,” Lexa says, her fingers relaxing against the warmth of her cup.

“I’m at MIT,” Clarke says, answering the question Lexa hasn’t asked.

She hums in response, and a nice sort of quiet settles over their table, a lull that Lexa can breathe in. It's the most normal conversation she’s had since the accident, so when Clarke breaks the silence again by asking “What are you doing out here?” she thinks for a moment before going with:

“Visiting family.” It doesn’t feel like a lie. She's spent the last two years living with Indra and Lincoln during term breaks, Christmases around their dining table and long summers on their patio. Their house was more of a home than her parents’ ever was.

Clarke seems to take her at her word, because she interrupts her thoughts to ask, "So you're from Boston originally?"

"No," Lexa says, noticing Clarke's fingers tapping awkwardly on the cardboard of her takeaway cup and realising that she’s waiting for her to expand. After a few seconds of contemplation, she adds, “Chicago.”

Clarke lets out a huff, like she’s giving up on trying to push her into conversation, and Lexa is torn between relief and an urgent desire to continue talking about something that isn’t funeral arrangements and how she’s coping.

She lets herself relax into the lapsed conversation instead; something about sitting across from someone in silent company lets her thoughts settle from the frantic marathon they’ve been running. A wave of solid exhaustion hits her, and she thinks that tonight, finally, she might be able to sleep.

Lexa finishes the last of her coffee and stands; she still has to get to dinner with Indra and Lincoln, but she has a few hours left to sit in the galleries before she has to leave. She swings her backpack over her shoulder, and Clarke stands with her.

“I’m going -” Lexa says, jabbing a thumb in the direction of the Monet exhibit.

Clarke nods, but her head is tilted in confusion. “I have to get back home.” Her words are stilted with awkwardness, and Lexa realizes that perhaps the silence wasn’t quite as comfortable for Clarke as it had been for her.

The exit is the same way as the gallery, and as they walk together, Lexa grips her backpack so tight that the weight of it cuts into her palm.

The guard at the ticket gate gives Clarke a cheerful wave of recognition. Lexa wants to say something - some further apology, or at least a goodbye - but the unease has dropped from Clarke’s face as she she smiles and nods at the ticket collector, and Lexa ducks into the gallery instead of having to deal with the discomfort.

Clarke probably deserved some sort of… if not apology, at least acknowledgement. But it’s too late, now.

She’s almost past the gift shop when a heaped display catches her eye.

**

**Raven Reyes**

last seen today at 5:12 PM

and then the dumbass just dropped the wrench  
on his foot it was GREAT                                            2:10 PM

Remember that girl I told you about?                                  4:31 PM  
  The one at the MFA?                                                           4:31 PM

 

you mean the one who tried to assault you?              4:37 PM

She didn’t try to assault me.                                               4:37 PM

i think your sketchbook and i beg to differ               4:39 PM  
but sure                                                                   4:39 PM  
did she come at you again                                        4:40 PM  
i can be at the mfa in like ten if you need                 4:40 PM

No, Raven, chill, I’m fine.                                                    4:44 PM  
She just bought me coffee.                                                 4:45 PM  
To be honest, I’m still really confused about it.                   4:45 PM

??????                                                                        4:46 PM

I know. She cut in line and paid for my coffee.                    4:47 PM  
Didn’t even give me a chance to say no.                              4:47 PM

that bitch                                                                 4:47 PM

Focus, Raven.                                                                      4:48 PM  
I’m still trying to figure out what she wanted.                                    
I thought she was trying to apologize but she never                          
really said anything?                                                            4:49 PM  
And while I’m at it, I should try to figure out why I had                      
the great idea to force her to sit with me so we could                        
have a very awkward attempt at a conversation.                  4:51 PM

i always did say you were too nice for your own  
good but no                                                              4:54 PM  
who listens to me ever really                                     4:54 PM

She probably still hates me for the drawing.                         4:54 PM

probable                                                                   4:55 PM  
you are terrible at drawing                                        4:55 PM

I think she said a grand total of ten words during our                         
'conversation’.                                                                      4:56 PM

girl the first time we met i think i said fuck off  
princess and look where we are now                         4:56 PM  
maybe she’s just terrible at small talk                       4:56 PM  
lord knows not everyone’s like you                           4:56 PM  
clarke?                                                                      5:06 PM  
dude are you actually having a meltdown about  
this???                                                                       5:13 PM

 

No, I’m just not comfortable letting it go without                                
trying to understand, I guess?                                              5:13 PM  
Does that make sense?                                                         5:13 PM

 

as much as anything you say does                            5:13 PM  
look we can talk more about this when you  
get home if you want                                                5:14 PM  
i’ll get some hot chocolate going                              5:14 PM  
but seriously i don’t want you worrying about  
some crazy girl who tried to have a coffee date  
with you after assaulting you                                    5:14 PM  
bitch can eat my fist for all i care                              5:14 PM

 

For the last time, she didn’t assault me.                               5:15 PM  
And it wasn’t a date.                                                            5:15 PM

 

regardless                                                                 5:16 PM  
girl doesn’t deserve any more of your time               5:16 PM  
i saw how upset you were when you came home  
the first time                                                             5:16 PM

 

 

I don’t think she’s that bad, though.                                   5:17 PM  
I mean, in the very few words she actually said                                  
I felt like we had some things in common?                          5:17 PM  
And there are worse ways to spend an afternoon.                5:17 PM

 

babe you see the good in everyone                            5:19 PM  
one day it’s going to get you hurt                              5:19 PM  
and i will hold you while you cry                                5:19 PM  
but i will also say i told you so                                   5:19 PM

 

Thanks for that, I guess.                                                      5:20 PM

 

love you too xx                                                         5:22 PM

** 

Lexa's apartment smells of Kostia's dying flowers. She tips the murky liquid down the sink, filling the vase from the tap and putting it back in her hallway near the window. Carefully, she tilts it towards the curtains until the most decomposed parts are hidden.

Her fingers catch on the paper gift bag as she’s rummaging for her phone. The corner of the postcard is bent, damaged by the chaos of the rest of her belongings, and Lexa straightens it with a thumb before placing it on the fridge. As she shifts a magnet over the top of the scene, she sees Clarke’s face as she denied liking Monet, the way she stared at her like she was sitting opposite someone unstable. It probably wasn't that far from the truth. Hopefully she made up for it. The return address she’d slipped amongst the packaging should give Clarke a way to reject her apology if she wishes, and getting her gift back unwanted and unopened is probably the least she deserves.

Lexa sighs, giving up on unpacking for now. The time difference means that despite leaving at nine, it’s only just past eleven now. It feels like those six hours on the plane really did disappear - she watched the same movie three times, but she still doesn’t know the lead character’s name.

She lies down in her side of the bed, her hand tucked under Kostia’s pillow, wishing for the weight of her head there, wishing that time could disappear like it did on that flight always so she could skip the hours until she doesn’t have to be here, crying over dead flowers and a handful of linen.

**

_~~Dear Indra,~~ _

_~~I am safely back in California. Thank you for the dinner. I have some things of Kos' that I~~_

**

_~~Dear Lincoln,~~ _

_~~Back in California. I hope everything is~~ _

**

**Father**

iMessage

**Sun 19 Oct** 2.29 pm 

Lexa, Berkeley sent out a newsletter about your school-mate’s  
unfortunate accident, and I see from my credit card statements  
that you have been enjoying yourself in Boston. I hope you are  
not taking too much time from your studies. We pay a lot of  
money for your education. Please don’t disappoint us, or we  
will have to re-negotiate your schooling arrangements.

**Today** 1.41 am

 I have obtained the necessary extensions. My GPA will not be affected. 

**

Clarke doesn’t think about Lexa again until she’s half finished putting away laundry and spots her sketchbook lying on her bed, hidden by a sweater and anatomy class notes. She pulls the book out, flips to the page with Lexa’s fingerprints pressed into the edges. The memory of Lexa’s face flushed with anger is a sharp contrast to the lines Clarke traces on the page. She thinks of the way Lexa had burst open for just those few moments and the heaviness around her that had dropped away before she had caved back into herself again. The brief fire of her lingers in Clarke’s mind.

If it wasn’t hopeless - the geographical distance between Boston and California is probably less than the distance Lexa seemed to hold herself from the world - Clarke would try to understand if Lexa was the fire, or the heaviness that seemed to hold her down. As it is, Clarke takes one last look at the fine lines of Lexa’s cheekbones and the smudges that trail down from her eyes before tucking the sketchbook away.

** 

 

_ [Sketch of Lexa that Clarke drew at the MFA]  _


	2. i want to make it all worth something (worth the guillotine on my head)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title taken from 'I'm A Fantastic Wreck' by Montaigne.
> 
> An absolutely HUGE thank you to our betas dealanexmachina and S.H. for their work this chapter; it wouldn't have been possible to achieve this without them.
> 
> And for your listening pleasure (if you so desire): [scryves' writing playlist](https://play.spotify.com/user/scryves/playlist/0q8XWxbLO3FArpd5ZKxpSj?play=true&utm_source=open.spotify.com&utm_medium=open) // [aeveee's writing playlist](https://8tracks.com/aeveee/chasing-down-silver-linings-we-are-coming-home)

The ticket gate boy surprises Clarke the next time she walks in by holding out a package. She almost says no right away because the ticket gate boy is nice, but she’s really not interested.

Then Clarke remembers what they say about assuming.

 

_Clarke,_

_It might not make up for damaging your drawings,_ _but I hope it will_

 _at least make up for damaging the_   _paper they were drawn on._

__-_ L._

The plain brown wrapping gives nothing away. Clarke rips it in her curiosity - unusual since she’s the child who refolds wrapping paper at Christmas, re-ties ribbons on gifts her father had always tried to peek into. She doesn’t know what to expect but the sketchbook that falls out somehow fits. The return address that tumbles out after it doesn’t, though.

For a while, Clarke runs her fingertips over the heavy cream of the sketchbook pages, the kind that she’s never been willing to spend the money on but has always coveted. Eventually, she turns her attention to the small slip of paper with Lexa’s address and wonders why it would have been included in the first place. When she sees the postcard through the gift shop window later, it’s an easy decision to drop a few dollars and slip it into her bag.

She doesn’t anticipate how long it takes her to find the words, though.

**

_October 22, 2014_

_Lexa,_

_I remember what you said about Monet being an ‘okay guy’. I guess the sketchbook you bought me is an ‘okay’ sketchbook too, by that measure. I know how much you love making small talk so I don’t expect you to write back, but I just wanted to say thank you._

_Hope you like the postcard choice,_

_Clarke Griffin_

 

 

 

  


_ [Monet’s The Cliff Walk at Pourville] _

 

**

Clarke drops the postcard off at the post office on her way to class and Lexa’s address goes into the folds of her sketchbook.

The questions of whether Lexa is happier back in California and who it was that she saw in the Monet stay curled in her chest.

**

 **Subject:** Update  
**Date:** Fri Oct 24, 2014 @ 4:52 PM  
**From:** Anya Wamplei  <anya.wamplei@berkeley.edu>  
**To:** Lexa Natron  <l.natron@berkeley.edu>

Lexa,

Following from the ASUC minutes that I just sent to the mailing list, you’ll see that not much has been agreed upon lately. Still, I’m happy to continue to act as interim president until you feel comfortable returning. I’ll press Gus harder to do the things he says he will (that charity run has been sitting as ‘outstanding from last week’ for three weeks now).  
Not to be repetitive, but please let me know if you need anything else. I’m around, you can come over for dinner, or we can get some practice in at the archery range. Both the ASUC and the Cal Archers miss you, but again: take your time.

Anya

 **Anya Wamplei**  
Vice President, University of California, Berkeley ASUC  
Range Commander, Cal Archery Team 2014  
Department of Political Science  
Class of 2015

**

A week passes, with the heating on its highest setting and open windows, until Lexa is no longer able to ignore the smell of rotting flowers. She takes them to her garbage - stands outside gripping their wet, decomposing stalks until her fingers burn with the cold.

**

There’s an inter-college game marked on her calendar, and Lexa pushes herself up and out of the house. She picks up her mail on her way out the door, letting the bills fall to the floor and studying the postcard that’s left, a small curious frown passing over her face as she flips it over to read.

It’s a far cry from the return to sender she’d been expecting, but there’s a slight reproach in the thank you, an assurance that she doesn’t need to write back made cutting by the knowledge that she wouldn’t have thought to without it. She props the postcard up on the empty side table in her hallway where the flowers used to sit.

She’s still considering the propriety of writing letters on paper torn from ring binders as she arrives at the repurposed softball field. She hadn't felt sure enough of herself to make any promises about this game, and the sharp stress lines on Anya's forehead smooth in relief when she sees her. Anya holds a hand up in greeting while Lexa picks up her compound bow, and she gives her a brief nod before heading over to the practice area. She checks the shafts of the arrows for faults, notches one and sights the target. The arc feels wrong, and she knows it's a mediocre shot before she registers where it lands.

The cost of taking up the slack of Lexa's absence has weighed Anya down, and though Lexa chose a spot far enough away to make it difficult to know what team she was even on, she can still hear Anya's voice as she makes a few more practice shots, strained and raised in frustration.

She draws back again, waiting until her breathing steadies in her chest. Her focus is still off, but Anya’s voice slips from her notice, and though it still doesn’t feel right, exactly, muscle memory has kicked in and her next attempts are better.

She stands apart from the team even as the match begins, Anya’s back a solid barrier between Lexa and the uncertain glances they cast her in between their banter.

The points are close, but they scrape a win, and the team mills around in an excited, self-congratulating circle as Anya packs up the group equipment and shoulders it.

Lexa waits until Anya has said her goodbyes to the group before she goes over to help, taking a bag from her and carrying it to her car in silence.

Anya gets into her car, but doesn’t turn the ignition until it’s clear Lexa doesn’t want a lift. She allows her her silence, just waving the fingers on her steering wheel in goodbye. Lexa puts an arm out, touches her windshield and Anya’s hand stills on the handbrake as she searches for words. "See you tomorrow," Lexa says eventually, and Anya’s eyes warm, flicking a smile at her as she puts the car into gear, and taking that for the promise it is.

**

 _ ~~Dear Clarke~~_ , she starts, frowning at the way the words look on cheap ruled paper, edges frayed from being ripped from their binding.

Later:

~~_It was nice meeting you._ ~~

and, after a delay to buy paper that doesn’t originate from a notepad:

_~~It was the first time in a while that I’ve~~ _

It’s almost a week before she manages anything resembling a response.

**

_Nov 12, 2014_

_Clarke,_

_Thank you for the postcard. Glad the sketchbook was okay._

_I hope your studies are going well._

_Lexa_

**

Raven holds out the mail to Clarke when she comes out of her room for dinner one night, eyes glazed from long hours of studying. There’s one envelope that’s thin but soft, and Clarke’s cheeks flush with surprise as she seems to recognize the writing on the back.

“Did this only come today?” Clarke asks. She tries for innocent but the way she focuses on the envelope rather than Raven while she asks gives away her curiosity. It makes Raven quirk a brow.

“Something super important, princess?”

“No. Just - ” Clarke bites off her words and focuses instead on tugging open the envelope. She pulls out a letter written on creamy paper. Raven watches Clarke read, charts the way her face shifts from barely held curiosity to confusion to exasperation in a span of seconds. “I wasn’t really expecting this.” After a pause, Clarke adds, “I don’t know what I was expecting.”

The smile on Clarke’s lips is wry as she folds the letter neatly along existing creases and tucks it back into the envelope. She takes the bowl of chili that Raven offers and holds it close, breathes in deep before letting out a long sigh of satisfaction. “This smells amazing. Sorry I had to bail on making dinner today.”

“Not a problem,” Raven says. Clarke waits until Raven has settled down before picking up her spoon and tucking in. “I’m not the one with two midterms left still. And anyway, I was getting tired of all those veggie-only meals we were eating. We’re not actually vegetarians, remember?”

Clarke hums and then smiles, teeth covered in chili. “Vegetables are good for you.”

“Whatever,” Raven laughs. “God, swallow before you smile please, that was disgusting.”

They eat in companionable silence after that, broken only by Raven’s offhand comments about her day and Clarke’s quiet laughter. When Clarke stands and motions for Raven to hand her the empty bowls, Raven waves her off and says, “It’s fine. Go study, I got this.”

“Rule is whoever doesn’t cook does the dishes.”

“It’s _fine_ ,” Raven says again, giving Clarke’s calf a little push and ducking when Clarke mimes a kick at her. “Seriously, go study.”

Clarke shakes her head and turns to go.

“Oh, and Clarke?”

“Yeah?”

“What was that letter about?”

Raven watches as Clarke shrugs a little, fingers playing along the hem of her sweatshirt. For a moment, it doesn’t seem like Clarke is going to answer, but then she smiles and says, “Nothing. Just someone I will probably never understand.”

Clarke disappears into her room after that and Raven blinks slowly before standing and starting in on the dishes.

“Who writes letters on paper these days, anyway?” Raven mutters to the soap bubbles.

**

_November 17, 2014_

_Lexa,_

_I’ve had a slew of midterms these past few weeks. I have one more left and then several assignments before exams. I hope you’re not nearly as overwhelmed as I am._

_Last weekend, I spent a few hours at the park so the sketchbook you gave me is getting its fair share of use. It’s getting a little too cold for outdoor drawing, though, so I may spend more time at the MFA instead. How’s the weather in California?_

_Thanksgiving break is soon, do you have any plans? Also, before I forget: how much do I owe you for the sketchbook? I meant to include that on the postcard but figured talk of money would mar the beauty of Monet._

_Clarke_

**

Lexa trips on the growing pile of mail just inside her apartment, swearing and slamming her shoulder into the wall as she falls awkwardly over her side table. The stack of bills and bank statements she’s been pushing to the side for weeks has been joined by more advertising, and she kicks it back out of the way. Her foot turns over a handwritten envelope, and she pauses, bending down to pick it up and bring it through to her desk.

She props Clarke’s letter up behind her textbook, and reads it as she highlights. Her highlighter bleeds through the paper as she considers the issue of repayment. She doesn’t want to have to state that it was meant as a gift and an apology, but she doesn’t want to discontinue their tentative correspondence entirely either.

There’s an easy normality in the things Clarke writes of that Lexa can’t match, but she attempts a response between bullet points.

The essay outline is finished long before the letter is.

**

_November 21, 2014_

_Clarke,_

_I have midterms that I need to catch up on. I will be spending the next few weeks studying._

_I hope the snow is not too bad._

_Enjoy your Thanksgiving,_

_Lexa_

**

No answer regarding the sketchbook - _of course_ , Clarke thinks - but at least there are five more words this time.

**

 **Subject:** 2014.11.22 ASUC Minutes  
**Date:** Mon Nov 23, 2014 @ 4:52 PM  
**From:** Anya Wamplei  <anya.wamplei@berkeley.edu>  
**To:** ASUC General Members  <asucmailinglist@berkeley.edu>

Dear All,

Attached are the minutes from last ASUC meeting. Please be advised that attendance has been dropping these last few meetings and we have some important events coming up. Our next general meeting is November 31. I hope to see a better turn out in preparation for the end of semester student faculty meet and greet.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Regards,

Anya

 **Anya Wamplei**  
Vice President, University of California, Berkeley ASUC  
Range Commander, Cal Archery Team 2014  
Department of Political Science  
Class of 2015

**

Lexa has to turn her phone on to order dinner, but she ignores the new notifications and turns it back off as soon as she’s hung up.

She watches an old movie on Netflix, a hollow space in her throat where thankfulness used to sit. She swallows it along with half the chicken pizza; saves the rest for breakfast tomorrow.

It’s not the first Thanksgiving she’s spent alone, but it is the first time she’s spent it without family in two years.

**

Excessive turkey makes Clarke lethargic and loose, and she flops onto the couch, listening to Raven and her mother fuss over oven settings and convection dynamics.

“I am the mechanic here. I have a degree.”

“Almost,” Abby says affectionately. “You almost have a degree. Now give me that pie.”

Their apartment is full of the fragrant smells of a spread that Raven and Clarke will be eating for at least a week. Clarke feels her eyelids droop, lets herself slip into a state of half-sleep that leaves her wandering thoughts to puzzle over Lexa’s letter. She retraces the short sentences in her head, the almost perfunctory responses and pointed absence of an answer to Clarke’s questions. The dissonance of repeated letters filled with silence is just as strange as a coffee bought in an apology that was never verbalized.

Raven is laughing at something Abby’s said when Clarke pushes herself off of the couch. “Trust Clarke to only appear when the work is done.”

Abby shakes her head, turns to her daughter with a bright smile and her face flushed from the open oven. “Still have room for pie?”

“Always,” Clarke says, and ducks Raven’s errant finger trying to smear whipped cream across her cheek. “It’s the famous Griffin pumpkin pie.”

If she feels a muted ache in her chest for her father - he used to smear whipped cream on her mom’s nose, used to try and steal pieces of Clarke’s pie but always gave her extra from his plate at the end - Clarke doesn’t show it. Instead, she lets Raven and her mother sandwich her on the couch and the warmth of their laughter washes away any lingering thoughts of Lexa’s letter.

 

**

 **Mother**  
iMessage  
2014-12-04 8:22 PM

Lexa sweetie, I just received your voicemail. Your father and I are  
at Mr. and Mrs. Cheltenham's country house this December, but  
there's a ham in the freezer. Have a good Christmas! x

**

 **Lincoln**  
iMessage  
2014-12-05 8:35 AM

Mom wants to make sure you know you are still welcome to  
come to ours for Christmas break this year.  
It would be good to have you there.

2014-12-05 10:49 PM

I already made alternate plans.

2014-12-05 11:37 PM

I didn't want to intrude. 

**

Lexa’s desk is covered in brightly colored notes, and her jaw is clenched around terminology she’s finding difficult to hold on to. She’s been struggling with the concentration required for her schoolwork, but she’s also been finding herself with nothing but empty time to fill, lately. She can’t remember what she spent her time on, before, and now there’s a yawning space where breakfasts and dinners and lunch dates used to be. She hopes that, all things considered, she’s in about the same position with her schoolwork as she would have been if -

Her phone vibrates on the thick stack of printed notes she’s staring past, and she looks at the caller I.D., almost letting it ring out before she steels herself and picks it up. “Hey.”

“What are your plans?” Lincoln’s voice is a smooth familiar comfort, but the cadence of his words is so like Kostia’s that it chokes the breath in her throat.

“My what?” she asks eventually. “I’m studying.”

“Christmas.”

Lexa is quiet for a moment, her phone pressing the cartilage of her ear against her skull, painfully tight.

“Friends.”

“The same friends’ place you were at for Thanksgiving? Bullshit. And what’s that crap about intruding?” His anger is rough, broken in the same places she feels the cracks, and she wraps a hand around her mouth, swallowing back the hurt.

It’s a good minute before she can take her hand away and say, “I can’t, okay?”

“Yeah. Fuck, we _get_ it, Lexa. You don’t have to talk-- Mom’s barely said a word about it, but don’t ignore us. _Be_ here.”

“I can’t,” she repeats, dizzy with the helpless wrong of it all.

“She won’t -” Lincoln’s voice gets cut off, and Lexa has a sudden, vivid image of Indra, motioning for his phone with impatience: _of course I had to do this myself_.

“Lexa, book a flight to Boston, or I will book one to California.”

Indra doesn’t do empty threats; Indra doesn’t even do threats. She just does.

Lexa agrees before she knows what she’s saying, “Okay.”

“Don’t you dare make me lose both of my girls.” Indra's whisper throbs with a pain that makes Lexa’s feel insignificant beside it, and her face burns with shame and guilt and tears. “Book the flight.”

There’s a click as she hangs up, and Lexa chokes out a reply she didn’t get to make: both a thank you and an apology twisting over each other on her tongue.

**

She sends the card before the nerves of seeing Indra and Lincoln swallow the thought. It’s been a month since she heard from Clarke ( _god_ , two since she’s heard from Kostia), and she figures it wouldn’t hurt to send a card to the only person who hasn’t been treating her like she’s missing half of herself, a Lexa-and-Kostia that’s been cleaved at the hyphen.

**

 

 

 

_ [A Christmas card featuring Monet’s Boulevard des Capucines] _

_Dec 19, 2014_

_Clarke,_

_Merry Christmas._

_Lexa_

**  
The card reaches Clarke during a last minute mailbox check. Raven is on the phone with Callie - arguing about turkey stuffing, of all things - and Clarke flips the plain envelope around, blinks at the return address.

“Look, I know you’re older and Abby trusts you, but seriously, celery is disgusting.”

“Leave Callie alone,” Clarke murmurs, tugging the phone from Raven’s hand and quickly saying, “Hi Aunt Cal, it’s Clarke,” before Callie can continue on her rant. Callie’s voice is full of affectionate anticipation as she tells Clarke that her mom is already at the apartment and they can’t wait to see her.

“We’re just heading out now. Is there anything you need us to pick up?”

“Not celery, apparently,” Callie says drily. “Hurry up though, Abby wants to put the turkey in now and I know Raven’s going to want to be there for that.”

Abby greets them at the door when they finally arrive, rosy cheeked from the crowded subway ride and the brisk walk up to Callie’s apartment. Raven gets pulled into a long hug before Abby turns her attention to her daughter, eyes as soft and warm as the hand that smoothes Clarke’s messy braid - a lighter twin to her own - and lingers against her cheek.

“Hi, honey.”

“Hi, Mom,” Clarke says. There’s a tightness in her chest that squeezes in time with Abby’s arms around her. Clarke swallows the ever present _‘Hi, Dad’_ as her father’s watch winks at her from her wrist; she trades it for what she hopes is a light, “Merry Christmas.”

Abby presses a kiss to her forehead before she turns Clarke over to Callie and Clarke doesn’t miss the way her mom’s fingers catch on the watch strap.

The hours of meal preparation pass easily, a mix of chaos in the kitchen - caused mostly by Raven’s obsession with the turkey - and a bubble of calm in the sitting area. Clarke has her feet pulled up beneath her, her favorite throw blanket spread across her legs and a cup of almost-finished peppermint tea in her hands as she sits by the window. Abby gives her a smile from across the room, a slight curve of her lips that fades as Callie tops up her glass of red wine and she turns back to their hushed conversation.

Clarke doesn’t realize she’s fallen asleep until she wakes to her mother standing over her, gently taking the empty mug out of her limp hands.

“Hey. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“I can’t believe I fell asleep,” Clarke says, stretching widely and rubbing her eyes. “Do you guys need any help?”

“We’re just about done, actually. Callie told me to go sit down so I think we’re banished from the cooking.”

Clarke looks over to find Raven and Callie frantically collecting turkey drippings, drizzling the stuffing and beginning the tenting process. Abby just shrugs when Clarke turns back to her and they share a private smile at the antics of their two best friends.

For a while, Clarke is content with sitting in silence with her mother, the familiar warmth of her hand on Clarke’s knee grounding her against nagging memories. Eventually the distant ache between her ribs gets the better of her and she says, “Remember when Dad tried to convince me that eggnog was better than chocolate and I tried to drink a whole cup because I didn’t want to believe my father would lie to me?”

Abby gives a sputter of laughter, looking at her with an expression that makes Clarke reach to cover the hand squeezing her knee. “Remember how much he drank afterward when you almost threw up and he wanted to make you feel better?”

“I don’t know how that was supposed to make me feel better,” Clarke says. “It was just as painful to watch him struggle through it.”

“Your father rarely did anything that made sense,” Abby sighs. Her fingers drift across Clarke’s collarbone, gently tuck an errant strand of hair away. “How about that time when he tried to pretend he was Santa and the beard fell off right as you went to hug him? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so taken aback.”

“And then I told Wells that Santa was actually my Dad, and Thelonious had to try and explain why _he_ had been in a Santa suit on Christmas night too.”

“That was a good time,” Abby says as Clarke laughs at the memory. She had been five at the time, a very self-righteous five, and the thought of her father lying to her was as sacrosanct as the idea that Santa didn’t exist. The following Christmas with the Jahas - both Thelonious and Jake had dressed in jolly red - had been an experience.

The silence they lapse into is a full one, equal parts bright and heavy, and Clarke wishes not for the first time that she could hug her mom and her smaller frame would be enough. She settles for tucking her head into the crook of Abby’s neck and rearranging the throw blanket so it covers them both. Abby presses a kiss to the crown of her head.

“How have things been?” Abby asks, voice soft in Clarke’s hair. “We haven’t talked in a while.”

“Things are going well,” Clarke says. She twines the edge of the throw blanket between her fingers, plays with the tassels on the end. “Classes have been fine. My exams ended a bit early this semester so I got to spend some time with Rose and her friends in the geriatric ward before the holidays.”

“That’s good,” Abby murmurs.

“I haven’t had a chance to talk to Dr. Tsing yet about shadowing her this summer, though. We both keep missing each other at the hospital.”

Abby shifts a little, adjusting Clarke’s head on her shoulder so that Clarke isn’t straining her neck. “Are you sure you want to spend your entire summer at the hospital? Dr. Tsing has some pretty intensive hours, and you’ve been working hard all school year.”

“It’s okay,” Clarke says. “It will be good practice for med school, anyway.”

“I just don’t want you overworking yourself,” Abby says, and she feels Clarke’s sigh against her side.

“Mom, I’ll be fine.”

“You’ve been doing really well this year, honey, but you still have a year ahead of you and application time can get really stressful.”

“Seriously, Mom,” Clarke says. She sits up, moves herself away from Abby. “If I’m going to be a doctor I need to get used to things like this. I mean, look at you.”

“I’m not a good example.”

“Whatever,” Clarke says with an eyeroll. Abby lifts an arm and Clarke hesitates for a brief moment before settling herself into her mom’s side again. Abby gives her a squeeze. “If I want to help -”

“I told you this before, honey, you need to keep yourself going before you can do that for other people.”

Clarke hums, shifts a little instead of answering. Abby gives her a curious look when Clarke straightens, fishing around for something under her leg before settling back down again.

“What is it?” Clarke pulls a white envelope out from under the blanket and Abby squints to read the writing on the back. “Where did you get that from?”

“I was sitting on it. Must have fallen out of my bag.”

“Card from a friend?”

Clarke smiles a little as she puts the envelope away. “Something like that.”

The card doesn’t get brought up again until after dinner, when Raven is fighting to do the dishes and Callie is insisting that she shouldn’t. Clarke sits on the couch turning the card over and over in her hands, the sugar cookies she’s just finished making for dessert baking in the oven. She flips open the card again, reads Lexa’s brief message and thinks of the letter she never responded to sitting in her desk drawer. The thought of what Lexa must think of her eats at her, although the contradiction in Lexa’s short words and her continued correspondence eases some of her guilt. Clarke startles when Abby leans over to wipe at a smear of flour on her cheek.

“You said this was from just a friend?”

“It is,” Clarke says, stuffing the card back into its envelope. The snow covered scene painted in Monet’s familiar strokes makes Clarke’s chest ache a little, and when she looks up at her mom she can see the same memory flickering across her face. She doesn’t say anything and Abby lets her be, settles down on the couch beside her.

“You know when I asked you how things were I wasn’t asking about your schoolwork. I was asking about _you_.”

Clarke blinks at Abby, confusion crossing her features. “I’m fine, Mom. _I’m_ fine.”

“Okay,” Abby says. She settles in closer to Clarke, leans over to press a kiss against her temple. “Your father would be so proud of you.”

Clarke can’t help the hitch in her voice when she says, “He’d be proud of you too.”

They sit together, wrapped in warmth and friendly bickering and the smell of sugar cookies in the oven, and when Clarke whispers, “Merry Christmas,” she imagines her dad’s wide smile over presents and adds that to the burgeoning tenderness in her chest.

**

Lexa’s co-passenger, a pinch-faced woman who shoved a bag in the seat between them before Lexa even managed to seat herself, tuts disapprovingly when she checks her phone. Anya has replied: a short, to the point message telling her that she’ll be there to pick her up at San Francisco Airport. The lack of any pleasantries makes Lexa smile as she powers her phone down and leans against the window, watching the lights of Boston disappear through cloud.

The last time she’d taken this flight it had been six hours of tumbling thoughts with too little to distract her. The seat beside her is just as empty, but this time, she’s coming from a Christmas of Indra, greeting her at the airport with a hug that felt easier than anything else in her life. Lincoln, putting laundry detergent into the dishwasher because it ‘looked the same’, and shocking them into laughter that almost didn’t feel inappropriate. A goodbye as she got into a taxi that didn’t feel like bridges were burning behind her. This time, her eyes close.

**

 

 

 

_[A card featuring Monet’s A Cart On The Snow Covered Road With Saint Simeon Farm]_

_January 5, 2015_

_Dear Lexa,_

_Happy holidays. Thanks for the card._

_Clarke_

And then, on a slip of paper folded behind:

_Sorry I never got back to you before this; I actually have half a reply on my desk but I figured a card in return for yours would be better._

_Also, I really don’t mean to push but I do need to know: how much I owe you for the sketchbook?_

**

_Jan 9 2015_

_Clarke,_

_I hope you had a good Christmas. Have your classes begun yet?_

_Lexa_

_P.S. - You don’t. It was free._

**

Clarke reads the letter once, twice, shakes her head at the postscript both times.

**

_January 15, 2015_

_Dear Lexa,_

_Christmas was really good; we had the most amazing feast. It feels like we’ve only just managed to finish our Thanksgiving leftovers and now we have a fridge full of Tupperware containers again. At least I won’t have to cook for a while._

_Classes have started and are already overwhelming despite being the first week back. I don’t think I’ve seen a faster decline in attendance than these past few days with the combined flu that is spreading around. Fingers crossed that I haven’t been infected._

_Did you have a good Christmas?_

_Clarke_

_PS: Seriously, I know my sketchbooks so I know the one you left me is definitely on the expensive side. Are you saying you got it for free? Why won’t you just tell me how much it costs? I’d really like to pay you back._

**

 **Subject:** Internship Application  
**Date:** Tues Jan 20, 2015 @ 7:36 AM  
**From:** Lexa Natron  <l.natron@.berkeley.edu>  
**To:** s.miller@oxfam.com

Dear Ms. Miller,

I am writing in response to your advertisement on the Oxfam website seeking interns. Please find my resume and cover letter attached.

I look forward to hearing from you about this exciting opportunity.

Kind Regards,

Lexa Natron

 **Lexa Natron**  
President, University of California, Berkeley ASUC  
Range Commander, Cal Archery Team 2014  
Department of Political Science  
Class of 2015

**

_Jan 20, 2015_

_Dear Clarke,_

_How many years of studies do you have left? I am applying for graduate internship and volunteer positions now._

_Repayment was not a factor in my decision to include a return address. It seemed only fair to give you the means to reject the gift. After our first meeting, I would not have wanted to force anything on you that you did not wish to accept._

_I hope that there are no longer any hard feelings between us, and that the events of that day do not discourage you from practicing your art. Your drawing was not a bad likeness. I should not have reacted the way that I did, but the sketch was of a private moment._

_In any event, please accept my thanks for the chance to put things right and do not ask further about the cost._

_I hope you avoid the flu outbreak, and that none of your other subjects react as badly as I did._

_Lexa_

**

Yesterday was a good day. Yesterday Lexa was focused in class, contributed to discussion, met with the high school student she mentors on Wednesdays, went to archery practice, made dinner with something other than a microwave or a phone.

Today, she’s supposed to be applying for internships. She’s supposed to be finishing a cover letter. She’s supposed to be vacuuming her apartment. She’s supposed to go to the gym, to be at a meeting of the student government, put on a load of laundry.

Instead, it’s two in the afternoon, the meeting is in less than an hour, and she has yet to do anything beyond managing to get out of bed and plugging the vacuum cleaner into the wall.

There’s nothing she can use to justify the change - nothing happened, other than an unease left by a half-remembered disturbing dream, but she’s lost whatever semblance of coping she found yesterday. She sat down on the couch after plugging in the vacuum cleaner and the day folded heavy around her, and she hasn’t been able to summon the energy to move since.

She hears the clatter of her mail flap, and blinks up from her contemplation of the laundry basket, eyes sluggish and tired. It’s been over a week since she sent off her last letter - maybe Clarke has responded. She shifts and stands, having to put a hand out against the wall as a black film slowly comes down over her eyes. She hasn’t eaten today, she realizes, but she goes first to the door instead of the fridge.

There’s a letter waiting for her, Clarke’s neat handwriting in a perfect box on the front of the envelope. Maybe it’s an artist thing, the way she can make the lines of an address perfectly even and straight.

The letter is long, and Lexa grabs an apple from the fruitbowl in her kitchen, standing with her hip pressed against the counter and eating as she reads.

She reads it quickly; re-reads it carefully. She folds it and puts it in her pocket as she leaves for her meeting, a smile flickering at the corner of her lips.

**

_January 24, 2015_

_Dear Lexa,_

_I think as an artist often times it’s easy to lose yourself in the way you perceive the world. It makes you forget that the beauty you see in the moment may be something that is not inherently beautiful at all, or something that was never meant for you to see. I know that probably sounds precocious but I am really sorry about that day. I didn’t realize that it was a private moment and I should not have overstepped._

_I guess if you’re going to insist on not letting me pay you back then I can only accept with my most gracious of thanks and ‘pay’ you back with my wit and charm in letters, instead. To be honest, I wasn’t quite expecting a continued correspondence when I sent you that first postcard. I had only meant to thank you for the sketchbook; I also have to admit I was a little curious about you. Either way, I’m glad that things turned out they way they did._

_And Lexa: there is nothing you need to put right. I like hearing from you, and I can only hope you like hearing from me too._

_I’m currently in my third year and looking into what I still need to tighten up for my medical school applications. I take it you’re graduating this year if you’re already applying for things? How’s the search going so far? What volunteer positions are you looking into?_

_Best regards,_

_Clarke_

**

Anya looks up from dates and names and terminology to find a half smile on Lexa’s face as she writes. Her pen moves easily across the page, but she’s referring to a creased piece of paper by the side of her textbook instead of the book itself.

Anya nudges at her with her elbow, not able to hide the delight in her murmured, “You’re not studying.”

Lexa looks up, immediately erasing any trace of the smile from her face.

“Of course I am,” Lexa says, holding Anya’s gaze with the same practiced look of believability she wears every time she repeats that she’s fine.

The piece of paper disappears underneath a textbook before Anya can see what she was writing, but when Lexa frowns down at her highlighted notes, she seems to be studiously avoiding Anya's raised eyebrows more than studying anything else. The huff of irritation at her interest does nothing to dispel the warm relief Anya feels.

Anya goes back to her lecture slides, and this time, when Lexa slips out the piece of paper, she doesn't let her curiosity interrupt.

**

_Jan 29, 2015_

_Dear Clarke,_

_As I have said, you do not owe me anything. I do appreciate hearing from you._

_Yes, I graduate at the end of this year. My aim is to work for a global charity. I am currently applying for long term internships in that respect, so that I can gain experience before I apply for the postgraduate program at Stanford (along with a variety of backup options). I agree that school is rather overwhelming. Writing to you is a nice break from writing cover letters, although I did almost start this with ‘I am writing to you regarding your advertisement’. It is becoming an unfortunate second nature._

_What made you want to get into medicine? Do you have a career goal in mind?_

_Lexa_

**

Clarke’s sure Lexa hadn’t meant the question as a soul-searching one - small talk about school and pastimes has slowly turned to inquiries about futures but maybe that’s just natural progression - and yet she still finds herself contemplating it.

Today, Clarke is in the geriatric ward for her hospital, volunteering with a few of her favorite books tucked under her arm. The nurses smile warmly at her as she walks past, some stopping to ask about her day. One of the nurses tells her that Mrs. Rucklova has been asking for Clarke since lunch, refusing to eat her mashed broccoli and carrots until she gets to listen to Clarke read her the next chapter. Clarke shakes her head at the familiar antics.

“Rose, remember what I told you about vegetables?”

Rose Rucklova is a beautiful old soul. Her eyes are warm and she keeps a constant stream of endearments for those around her, rattled off in rapid Czech. She also has radiant gummy smile that she shows as Clarke steps into her room.

“Cla’ke!”

“Hi, Rose,” Clarke laughs. “How are you today?”

“I e’t my veget’bles, Cla’ke, I did.” Rose pats at her stomach as she says this, rubs at Clarke’s arm with a fond hand. Clarke catches Rose’s hand and holds it in hers. “I e’t the veget’bles.”

“That’s not what Nurse Huang told me. She said you wanted to hear my stories instead.”

“I do, I do!” Rose trembles from the force of her excitement and Clarke holds her hand tighter. “ I e’t. Now is read time, Cla’ke.”

So Clarke pulls out the novel she’d been reading last with Rose, turns to the well worn page and slowly settles into George’s print shop and Kumiko’s artwork that holds so much allure even though she and Rose can only see them through words. Rose hums as Clarke reads, follows her up and down each sentence, each dip and rise of the story.

It’s an hour later - the sun starting to set and casting the room in rich yellows and oranges - when Clarke finishes the chapter and she slips the bookmark in place. Rose is blinking sleepily at her.

“Did you like the chapter, Rose?”

Rose nods, moves to clasp Clarke’s free hand in her wrinkled, shaky ones and says, “One more, Cla’ke?” even as she lets Clarke help her into a sweater and a nurse comes in with Rose’s dinner.

“I’ll be back next week and we’ll read the next chapter together then, okay?” She gives Rose’s hand one last squeeze before slipping out of the room.

On her way out of the hospital, Clarke swings by the pediatric oncology ward, trading the warm hues of sunset for bright picture book characters painted along the playroom walls. She’s greeted by screaming children who tackle her at the knees, and the laughter that bubbles out of her is uncontrollably light. Clarke runs a hand over the crown of each of their heads - some soft and bald, others covered with only just thinning hair - and tries not to think about how most of them are clutching at her to catch their breath from a run that isn’t all that long.

She finds Johnny in a bean bag chair at the back of the playroom, stuffed animals piled high all around him. The other kids must have recognized the paleness of his face and the way his eyes won’t stay open. Clarke kneels down next to him and brushes her fingers over his brow, whispers, “Hey, buddy.”

Johnny can’t quite open his eyes and Clarke hums soothingly while he tries to say something, once, twice, bile and fatigue clogging his throat. Eventually, Johnny just weakly wiggles his fingers and Clarke clasps them in her own. Johnny manages a faint smile.

“I heard you were a superhero today. I’m so proud of you, buddy.”

Clarke spends the next few minutes murmuring soothing words while she runs a hand through Johnny’s hair, and the sharp discomfort in Johnny’s features seems to ease little by little. Just before she’s sure he’s going to fall asleep, Clarke pulls out the picture book she’d saved for him and tucks it under his arm.

“I brought something for you, I think you’ll like it. It’s a story about a brave boy who goes on a grand adventure, just like you. He flies all the way from the moon. I’ll read it to you next week, okay?”

Johnny nods, grasps at the book with flimsy fingers, and Clarke brushes his hair back before standing, knees cracking slightly.

When she gets home, the letter from Lexa stares up at her from her desk. _What made you get into medicine?_ Clarke thinks of Rose, translucent skin holding in decades of love and loss and life, of Johnny who fights to breathe and laugh through the chemicals waging war with his body. She wants to help and she wants to hold and she wants to save and love and cherish. She wants so many things.

In the end, she settles for writing only some of them, the rest weighing heavily on the tip of her pen.

**

_February 5, 2015_

_Dear Lexa,_

_I envy that you’re so close to the end of your studies although I don’t think I envy the job search. Global charities are an interest of mine as well. I spent last summer doing volunteer work for Medecins Sans Frontieres at their New York office and I would love to go back to work for them in the field once I’m qualified. For now, I’m volunteering at the local hospital and learning a lot from all the people there._

_Wow. Stanford is quite impressive. It’s also quite close to Berkeley which would make the transition into post-graduate life somewhat easier. (I assume you're not too affected by inter-college rivalries because you seem to have picked two schools that hate each other...) There are so many things that are overwhelming about entering a new stage in life, it would be nice to eliminate one thing off of the list. I’ll probably be applying all over the nation for medical school so I may not have that luxury._

_Whenever someone asks me why I got into medicine, I always say my mom. She’s a general surgeon at Harvard and she also teaches a couple of classes in the joint M.D. Ph.D program with M.I.T. I grew up hearing about the people she helps and seeing the difference she makes and it’s easy to say she inspired me, but in reality, I think that’s just a simple answer to a complex question. I admire my mom a lot and I want to help people just as she does. As for the rest of my motivations… maybe I’ll tell you sometime when I’ve figured them out better for myself._

_What inspired you to study the political sciences? I’m sure it wasn’t your love of people. (See? Wit and charm.)_

_Sincerely,_

_Clarke_

**

 **Lincoln**  
iMessage  
2015-02-06 9:30 PM

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Of2HU3LGdbo>

Oh god

you said you had an essay due tomorrow. what, you thought  
our tradition was over?

Cat video study breaks is not our tradition

Lexa, if you keep being that wrong about everything you'll  
fail your class for sure

Don’t you have work tomorrow?  
Go to bed

did you watch it until the end, though?

GO TO BED.

knew it

I’m ignoring you now

2015-02-06 9:53 PM

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-VZc04hLk0&list=PLgPKD7AsF_H1OBI5okzya-TE5IGGn0_Wn](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-VZc04hLk0&list=PLgPKD7AsF_H1OBI5okzya-TE5IGGn0_Wn)

shark cat study dance break

Seriously, Lincoln. Stop.

2015-02-06 10:25 PM

I know it was a thing that the three of us did together.  
Just thought it would be good to have something normal  
again. Sorry, good luck with your essay.

2015-02-06 10:37 PM

I didn’t mean that.  
The cat videos have always been a good distraction.

2015-02-06 11:41 PM

Still awake?

Yep. Finished your essay?

**  
Lexa’s scrolling through her contacts even before she presses the submit button on the university’s online portal, and Lincoln picks up as she’s closing her laptop and slipping into bed.

“Hey.” His voice is low and rough, and Lexa sighs.

“I-” she starts.

“I thought you were-” Lincoln stops.

“I wasn’t. I mean. It was. But.” Lexa rolls to her side, tucking the phone under her ear and blinking back sleepy gravel from her eyes.

Lincoln is silent, and Lexa blurts, “It’s good to be normal.”

Lincoln’s laugh rasps in her ear. “Well, we can try.”

“Right,” Lexa says, wincing at the uncertain, forced note of optimism in her voice that clangs awkwardly through the phone.

“I should have kept in touch more. She moved out, and I sent dumb videos, but we never talked.”

“That’s not true,” Lexa says immediately. “Just because she moved out... She was busy. You both were.”

“Not much of an excuse, is it?”

His words are bitter, and Lexa thinks of how often she and Kostia had laughed over one of Lincoln’s videos, of how he always answered the phone on the first ring whenever Kostia needed him.

“That’s not true,” Lexa says again, not enough words for anything other than a helpless sort of repetition. She wonders what parts of Kostia she’s lying to herself about; which bits of Kostia’s life they’re tearing apart to keep of her memory. What they’ll leave themselves with.

“Fuck, I just-”

“Yeah,” Lexa agrees, before he can find the words to finish. She curls her knees up, rests her cheek on the sharp protrusion of bone. “You should go to sleep.”

“So should you,” Lincoln points out.

The sun is up in Boston before either of them take the advice.

**

_Feb 10, 2015_

_Dear Clarke,_

_I chose Stanford because of the quality of its program, and when I visited in high school I never wanted to leave. Stanford and UC Berkeley may not have the most friendly of inter-college relationships, but I liked my current school for its extra-curriculars, and I suppose I can use competitive school spirit as the first test of my political career._

_Geographical proximity isn’t a factor, however, I want to travel. That is why I studied international relations: to give me that opportunity once my studies are completed._

_What were you doing with MSF? That would have been very interesting, particularly in your area of study. I have only ever helped to provide monetary support for medicine, or the organisational aspect of its provision. Directly helping people with your own medical expertise must be a very different sort of responsibility._

_Did your mother want you to follow her career path?_

_As for why I chose politics, I find it difficult to see things that are wrong without having the ability to do something to fix them. (And, despite first impressions to the contrary, diplomacy is not completely beyond my grasp.)_

_Lexa_

**

_February 14, 2015_

_Dear Lexa,_

_I don’t think I ever had a particular college that I’ve been dying to go to. M.I.T. has been a blessing and when it comes to medical school, I’ll be hoping to get into wherever I can. Perhaps the closest thing I have to a pipe dream is Harvard? Are you hoping to work globally once you graduate?_

_Since I’m still only an undergrad and I have no actual medical training, I was only able to help out with the clerical side of things at MSF. They have multiple projects overseas that I would love to participate in in the future. I think I’d like to help teach and establish programs in more rural areas; less of a direct application of medicine and more trying to help and give to the community, I know, but I think my interests have always leaned more toward patient interaction than surgery._

_My mom, ironically, has always been the one to tell me to do what I want to do. According to her, I have the instincts of someone who can be successful at many things, but I need to be careful about focusing solely on taking care of everybody else first. It’s a strange thing to hear from a doctor - she takes care of others for a living - but she’s been nothing but successful so far so I should probably take her word for it._

_Do you always like to pick impossible challenges? Trying to change things via politics seems like an extremely daunting task. Still, I think I can understand the need to help facilitate change for the better in whatever small ways we can manage. Here’s to hoping that we will actually achieve something!_

_Oh, and I just remembered the date. Happy Valentine’s Day._

_Sincerely,_

_Clarke_

**

The offhand cheer of it is no different to the rest of her letter, but Lexa doesn’t know how to separate the Valentine’s Day greeting from the girl she’d made plans to spend it with.

In the end she makes no mention of it in her response, and when she throws the envelope of Clarke’s letter away, she lets the two tickets with Kostia’s name on them fall from her fridge and into the bin as well.

**

_Feb 20, 2015_

_Dear Clarke,_

_There is nothing impossible about change; although it is often on a smaller scale than you originally expect. Even a small change now can lead to a large impact over time._

_(Although I suppose not all change is positive.)_

_Perhaps it is strange for a doctor to tell you to ensure you focus on your own needs over others and to do what you honestly wish to, but it does sound like advice from a good mother._

_I would like to eventually settle back here, but in the meantime I have so many places that I want to see, and internships or volunteer work overseas would be a fantastic opportunity to further my career whilst doing so. I am very impatient for my undergraduate studies to be over so that I can leave California for a while._

_Do you have any places that you would like to work in particular?_

_Lexa_

**

 **Raven Reyes**  
last seen today at 3:17 PM

clarke if you’re going to keep getting  
so many things in the damn mail  
PICK UP THE MAIL YOURSELF                           3:14 PM  
sincerely your mother                                     3:15 PM  
joking                                                             3:17 PM  
i’m not nearly as hot as your mom                  3:17 PM

 

Clarke clatters into the kitchen right as Raven plucks the shopping list off the fridge. There’s a smirk on Raven’s face that Clarke doesn’t quite like as she says, “You ready, Griffin?”

“You realize you could have just told me we have mail in person, right?” Clarke grumbles, moving to the pile of envelopes and fliers Raven has left haphazard on the counter. She fishes Lexa’s letter easily out of the mix, the cramped, methodical writing familiar by now. Her eyes linger over the way the C and G curve around the rest of the letters before she leans into the doorway of her room and tosses the letter onto her bed.

“Alright, let’s go.”

The granny cart Abby had given them when Clarke had first moved out is old and rickety, and Clarke keeps a loose hand on it as they make the short trek to the grocery store. It rattles over every crack in the sidewalk, wheels threatening to fall off with every bounce. Raven’s hair has a single braid in it today and Clarke gives it a tug to annoy her.

“Okay, just for that I’m getting Oreos instead of lettuce.”

The goodnatured sniping carries on as Clarke runs down the grocery list Raven hands her. She picks out zucchini for the baking itch she’s been having, eggplant because Raven has been craving lasagna. The nachos Raven tries to sneak in get replaced by taco shells. Raven gives her an unimpressed look when she drops off a package of ground beef and goes off in search of tomatoes and onions.

Two more spats later - Clarke loses the quinoa fight based on price alone and Raven is ferocious about the chicken fingers - and they’re lining up for the cashier, rummaging for the envelope they’ve put their shared cash for groceries into. Raven’s fingers fly over her phone keyboard and Clarke peers over Raven’s shoulder, sees ‘ _Monty Green_ ’ on the top of the screen.

“Tell that mop-for-hair he left a bottle of his toxic Kill-Aid in our kitchen and he needs to remove it before it spontaneously combusts and burns our apartment down.”

“I will text no such thing,” Raven says. She knocks Clarke’s chin off of her shoulder with a gentle shrug and grins at Clarke’s frown. “We’re working on our chem eng project tomorrow night. We need all the help we can get.”

“I’m not sure how killing even more brain cells constitutes help, but okay,” Clarke says. The cashier motions for them to move up the line and Clarke shuffles forward, starts loading their purchases onto the conveyor belt.

By the time they’ve paid - Raven high fives herself at making exact change and staying within budget even with the extra ice cream she’d swiped - Clarke is tugging her jacket sleeve up and checking her watch, frowning in thought.

“Hey, I need to grab something from the post office, do you mind heading home first and I’ll come help unload after?”

Raven is already taking the granny cart handle from Clarke’s hand, starting to wave her off and turning away before she answers, “I’m not putting all of this away by myself, Griffin, so you better get your ass back home ASAP. And I’m making tacos tonight; any requests?”

“Just keep the spice level at a two, please.”

Raven laughs. “Weakling. Get out of here.”

Clarke is halfway to the post office when her phone rings and she picks it up, tucking it between her shoulder and her ear as she pulls the door open and moves towards the postage stamp rolls. “Hello?”

“I forgot to ask,” Raven’s voice filters through, amusement intact despite the slightly tinny connection. "What exactly do you need from the post office anyway?”

“None of your business,” Clarke replies. She motions at the girl working the counter that she needs a few more of the stamps she’s chosen and fishes her wallet out, listening to the sounds of cupboards opening and closing and Raven muttering about overdue yogurt in the fridge. For a while, the only thing breaking the comfortable silence on the line is Raven’s intermittent comments about their beer stash and Clarke paying for her stamps. Raven doesn’t say anything again until Clarke is out of the post office, tugging on her hood at the drizzle that’s just starting.

“Monty says he wants to come over for dinner tonight. He made too much pulled pork and figured he’d share. You down?”

“Of course. Tell him he’s welcome so long as he limits the alcohol he brings with him.”

“Spoilsport,” Raven gripes. Clarke hitches her bag up a little, checks to make sure the postage stamps are safe from the rain. She almost misses Raven’s next words as she closes her bag and wonders if the Impressionist sailboats will be as appreciated as she hopes.

“So. When exactly are you going to tell me who this Lexa Natron is?”

Clarke’s cheeks flush in spite of herself and she knows Raven knows even if she can’t see her. “Stop reading my mail, Reyes.”

She hangs up while Raven is still laughing and wonders when something as simple as pleasantries on paper became something a little bit more.

 

**

_February 27, 2015_

_Dear Lexa,_

_I have to say, at times I had wondered about you being in politics considering how quiet you are, but then you say things like ‘change is not impossible’ and I can see it._

_To answer your question as to where I’d like to work in the future, I thought I’d share a story from my day today:_

_To set the stage, I volunteer at the local hospital in several capacities; every week I head an arts and crafts program for the kids in the oncology ward. (Actually, it started as a reading club but kids get sidetracked easily and I’m running low on books to read.) We’ve been working on very simple canvas paintings for the past couple of weeks. There is one little girl there, Sophia, who has been making excellent progress but only seems to ever want to paint if she can sit next to me._

_This week, Sophia disappeared at the beginning of class and when she came back, she was tugging another little girl along behind her. She told me today she was going to help Claire with her painting and save her own for next week. I don’t know why, but watching Sophia do little things like hold the paintbrush with Claire and tell Claire her flower was beautiful - it really reinforced my desire to try to make a difference and help these kids._

_I want to be able to help children all over the world, ones who are suffering not only from illness but also those who have no families and who have so little in general. I think for me, it’s important to heal not only the physical injuries, but also those we don’t necessarily see._

_So yes, when you asked me what I wanted to do in medicine and I told you my mom inspired me, that was the simple answer. The rascals in the oncology ward who always try to get paint on my jeans also inspire me, especially when they’re so weak from medication that they can barely lift their hands but they always try. I think anywhere where there is a need for someone to care for people, to try and help heal, I’ll try to be there._

_That was a lot to leave you with, I hope at least a part of it made sense. Tell me about some of the places you want to visit?_

_Sincerely,_

_Clarke_

**

Clarke's letter runs to two pages, and Lexa reads it whilst sitting in a lecture. There’s a sweet optimism in it that Lexa doesn’t know how Clarke has retained; maybe she hasn’t worked in the hospital long enough, maybe she hasn’t seen enough death to have been tainted by it yet, but she finds herself hoping that Clarke lets it fuel her determination rather than tarnish the earnest desire to help that radiates from every sentence. She writes back instead of attending to her lecture notes, and when she reads over them - Clarke’s letter, and her response - the difference in tone makes her wince.

She can’t sound as positive as Clarke, but she can only hope she hasn’t sounded indifferent to Clarke opening up, even more so than usual.

**

_Mar 4, 2015_

_Dear Clarke,_

_I would like to work with children, though not one on one long term. There are a lot of children without parents, and a lot of orphanages that are in need of help. I am aware that a short term volunteer position is only a band aid solution to a long term problem, but getting on-the-ground experience of the issues that such institutions are facing would greatly help any attempt to assist I might want to make in the future._

_I am looking forward to travelling around Europe - France, Germany, but particularly the more remote parts where perhaps there are less people willing to travel - is that why you want to work in rural areas?_

_What sort of age group are the children you work with? I have several suggestions for age-appropriate literature that I could pass along if you are interested._

_Your letter made more sense than you give yourself credit for. I appreciate you sharing your stories with me; are these the motivations you have been trying to figure out better for yourself?_

_Lexa_

**

_March 12, 2015_

_Dear Lexa,_

_The problems associated with short term aid efforts and the strides we still need to take to achieve effective change is a topic I spend a lot of time thinking about. Usually it’s within the context of medical and relief operations, but I’m sure you would have interesting things to say regarding policy changes. At times I think I’d like to pursue the betterment of aid effort implementation and the underlying system but then that would limit my chance for direct patient contact._

_I think certain med school-bound students tend to think a lot about the benefits of placements in terms of their own gain. Large city centres not only have the greater pick of hospitals but also cutting edge technology and a larger patient pool. Others tend to flock toward rural areas for sometimes just the novelty. In my case, I just want to help wherever I can, wherever I could be needed. Naive, I know, but that’s the goal. Whether that will take me to a small town close to home or somewhere across the world remains to be seen._

_I currently work with children between the ages of 4 to 18 but my most avid reading club attendees are around 6 or 7. Those book suggestions would be great, actually. I’m surprised you have them since you’re studying to be a politician, but I’m not complaining…_

_Thanks for listening to me ramble again, I guess - I don’t quite know how that translates in letter format. I hope I haven’t inundated you. Speaking of, how are classes going? Spring Break is coming up, any plans?_

_Sincerely,_

_Clarke_

**

 **Indra**  
iMessage  
2015-03-04 1:30 PM

Hi Indra, looking forward to seeing you soon. My flight number is UA1755  
and I get in at 4:49 PM. I was wondering, while I’m in Boston, if I can take  
some of Kos’ old books to the hospital? I have a friend who works with   
sick children there and can put them to good use.

  
**

_Mar 19, 2015_

_Clarke,_

_I am actually leaving for Boston tonight for Spring Break (hence this rushed correspondence). I don’t know if you would like to meet, but if you are amenable I can be contacted at (510) 555 0125._

_Lexa_

**  
The sudden offer in Lexa’s reply takes Clarke by surprise. Her hand reaches to her phone, hovering outside her pocket for a moment. Her eyes land on the growing stack of envelopes on the top corner of her desk, and the decision seems to make itself.

**

 **(617) 555-0119**  
Text Message  
2015-03-24 11:28 PM

Hi, this is Clarke Griffin.

 

2015-03-25 12:07 AM

Hello.  
This is Lexa.

 

2015-03-25 12:23 AM

Hi, Lexa. I’m glad I didn’t get the wrong number.  
When are you free to meet?


	3. gather our letters (carry us further)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from 'Go Ahead' by The Rosebuds. Thanks to dealanexmachina and S.H. for the beta-ing, and also to girlintharsiscity for her helpful fact checking in this chapter.
> 
> For your listening pleasure yet again: [aeveee's writing playlist for this chapter](http://8tracks.com/aeveee/we-re-just-a-lie-away)

The subway hasn't even begun to slow before Clarke is shifting towards the doors, burrowing her chin into her scarf and checking her watch again. 3:17 PM. She winces, fishes for her phone and throws out a hand to keep from falling as the train comes to a stop at the T-station.

There's a crowd of children exiting before her, and Clarke slips past them with a muttered apology, her eyes on the bars of reception on her phone. There are no new text messages from Lexa. The last in their chain is Clarke's hurried _'Running late, on subway soon'_ , and Clarke berates herself for getting distracted by her kids, by Nurse Huang and the peppermint candies she couldn't refuse. Her coat pocket is full of them, and she wonders if Lexa even likes peppermint. It'll be a moot point anyway if she gets there to find that Lexa has left, dissuaded by a wait that’s now bordering on rude.

By the time Clarke reaches the front steps of the MFA, her scarf has fallen loose and she sniffs, scanning the people milling about. In the back of her mind, she hopes for a spark of recognition - a mane of curls, a bright red coat - but she knows that Lexa won’t look the same as their last encounter, that it’s a naive thought.

Her gaze stutters over a girl with intricate braids and a deep navy peacoat, and when the girl turns, Clarke finds a face her pencil is intimately familiar with.

“Lexa.”

There’s a taut silence as Clarke climbs the stairs, fiddling with the strap of her bag while she moves closer to where Lexa is waiting for her. People part around them, eager to get into the museum, and Clarke only notices the stiffness of Lexa’s stance - cheeks pink from cold, shoulders pulled tight around her ears - when she comes to a stop. Lexa’s gaze is inscrutable, and Clarke shifts from foot to foot until Lexa finally blinks, a slow thing that her head follows with the barest of tilts. Clarke feels herself loosen just a little.

“Clarke,” Lexa says. Her voice is smooth, pushes a little on the click of Clarke’s name. It reminds her of the way her name is written on the front of a number of envelopes, but the thought dissipates at Lexa’s curt, “You’re late.”

Clarke winces. A microexpression of discomfort crosses Lexa’s face, as if the accusation had slipped out despite her intentions, and Clarke is saved from answering when Lexa jerks an arm out to open the door. “It’s cold. The lobby will be warmer. Let’s go in.”

Lexa’s insistent politeness is a familiar one, something usually seen on paper now given a voice in person. Clarke thinks that the give of Lexa’s words is more than her rigid unease would suggest, and she wonders if this goodwill is the result of their correspondence. Lexa busies herself with unbuttoning her coat, fingers flexing aimlessly when the buttons are undone, and Clarke’s ears grow pink from nerves.

“Have you been waiting outside this whole time?” Clarke asks once it becomes clear that Lexa is waiting on her. Lexa’s eyes snap up from the flap of her coat pocket she’s been fiddling with and she gives a sharp shrug.

“No.” A pause. Clarke unwinds her scarf, watches Lexa straighten. Eventually, Lexa amends, “It was not a long wait.”

They separate then, Lexa murmuring something about purchasing a ticket and disappearing into the line before Clarke can respond or offer to pay. Lexa only returns to Clarke’s side after they’ve both passed the old man checking tickets, and Lexa’s stiff smile slips in favor of a look of studied indifference.

“I’m sorry I was late,” Clarke offers, watching Lexa’s eyes flick from painting to painting on the walls around them, “I had meant to get here for quarter to, not quarter after.”

“It’s fine.”

Clarke worries her lip, casts around for another sentence in the quiet Lexa leaves. She lands on the remembrance of her coat pocket and she clutches at it, fingers slipping around a crinkling wrapper. “As an apology, could I interest you in a peppermint candy?”

Lexa’s silence - unyielding but seemingly free of judgement - lasts twenty long beats of Clarke’s pulse in her ears. It isn’t until she finally reaches out to take the sweet Clarke has offered her that Clarke starts to feel marginally better. The feeling is quickly replaced by guilt when she notices how cold Lexa’s fingertips are as they brush against her palm, and the guilt would grow if it weren’t for the small smile Lexa gives her while she carefully unwraps the candy and pops it into her mouth.

“Thank you,” Lexa says afterward, and Clarke ducks her head at the thawing of Lexa’s tone. She busies herself with unwrapping another peppermint candy.

They only begin to move toward the exhibits when Clarke realizes they’ve been standing just inside the ticket gate for a while now, hesitant and shy while their peppermint candies melt to slivers on their tongues. She asks Lexa if she’s seen one exhibit or another, receives a negative more often than not. Clarke makes sure to walk slowly through each one even though she’s seen everything at least twice, and Lexa follows at an easy pace, giving a faint smile every time Clarke turns to check on her. There’s a moment of surprise every time Lexa meets her gaze, and Clarke finds the way Lexa blinks at her worrying at first, then endearing.

It’s close to five when Clarke reaches the Monet exhibit. They’ve been walking non-stop for over an hour, mostly in contemplative silence, and Clarke hesitates at the entrance when she remembers the last time they were here. She feels Lexa come to a stop beside her.

“We met here,” Lexa says after a beat. Clarke turns to face Lexa and takes in the contrast of her profile against the light, tight braids pulling hair back and the curl of long eyelashes. Her fingers itch for a sketchbook and pencil she doesn’t have, and a bubble of laughter tickles her throat at the thought of how Lexa would react if she did. Clarke tamps it down, lets only a smile peek through.

“We did,” Clarke says. Lexa turns to look at her then, eyes clear and slightly curious and Clarke adds, “Did you want to go in?”

Lexa nods.

This time, Clarke is the one to follow as Lexa guides her around the room. She watches the way Lexa leans in to each painting, brow creasing as she takes in the dappled brushstrokes. The look of absorbed concentration only breaks when Lexa reaches the painting of the house by the sea and she turns to Clarke, expression unreadable.

“Is this one your favorite?”

Clarke hums, dropping her bag down on the bench in front of them. Lexa hesitates for a moment before settling onto one end of the bench, and she keeps her eyes on the painting as Clarke settles onto the other. “This was actually my dad’s favorite piece.”

“I remember,” is all Lexa offers. Clarke thinks back to their conversation over coffee, the way Lexa had looked at her then.

The way Lexa looks at her now, silent but earnest, pulls at her in the same way Lexa’s letters have. She searches for a memory that is more laughter than nostalgia and turns to fully face Lexa.

“My family had a summer home, before. We used to go every year, and my dad would sail while me and my mom would watch him from a house not unlike this one.”

Clarke guides Lexa’s focus back to the painting with a tilt of her chin and begins to recall the time she was seven and her dad had taken her out onto the water. She paints the story as vividly as she can: describes the salt in the air, the joy of her father’s laughter.

“There was another time my mom came out with us and the waves were a bit more than we’d expected. She almost fell out of the boat. My dad used to say it was my quick reflexes that saved the day but I was only nine, way too small to make a difference.” Clarke sighs, a laugh on her lips. “That was my dad for you.”

The answering laughter from Lexa seems to surprise them both. Lexa’s face is the most open Clarke has seen it, touched with a wistful softness that looks right on her features, and the past tense isn’t as painful as it could be when Lexa says, “He sounds like he was a good man.”

Eventually, Clarke’s stories dry and they sit side by side, gazing at the painting and the phantom memories of Clarke’s childhood. Clarke chances a look at Lexa to find the easiness in her expression has disappeared in favor of a weighted sadness. A distant ache in Clarke’s chest surfaces in recognition.

“Who are you thinking of?” Clarke asks carefully after she watches Lexa’s jaw work around words that won’t seem to form. Lexa fingers clench around the edge of the bench in response.

“I -” The words die, try to come back. “I had a -” After two more attempts, Lexa stops, shoulders tense with effort and chokes, “Change the subject. Please.”

“Okay,” Clarke says. She starts talking about her day, fills the thick silence between them with chatter about fingerpainting and mashed broccoli and watches as Lexa’s white-knuckled grip on the bench slowly begins to fade. When she can finally see Lexa’s fingers again, Clarke ventures a soft, “Would you like to go get some coffee?” The nod Lexa gives is small, fingers knotting over and over in her lap the same way they had around the cigarette box Clarke remembers from before.

(She can’t imagine Lexa is in the mood for idle chatter. She can’t imagine Lexa is in the mood for anything, but silent company is something Clarke can provide and she recalls all the times her mother had tried to do the same for her when things had still been fresh. Clarke bites back the pain that threads out at the memory.)

They walk wordlessly from the gallery to the cafe. Clarke orders Lexa a large black coffee, puts down a twenty before Lexa can and takes the cup when Lexa doesn’t make a move for it. The table Clarke guides them to isn’t the same as before but the way Lexa hunches into the steam is, and Clarke would smile if it weren’t for the situation. She sips at her latte and occupies herself with people watching, gives Lexa an easy, patient silence.

It isn’t until much later that Lexa finally speaks, her voice quiet and chipped as she asks, “Do you have your sketchbook with you today?” Clarke turns to look at her, realizes Lexa must have noticed her gaze following the people around them and her finger tracing along the tabletop. She offers a sheepish smile.

“No. I figured today wouldn’t be much of a drawing day.” When Lexa doesn’t immediately look down at her coffee again, Clarke hazards a light, “And anyway, I thought you wouldn’t appreciate it judging from how you reacted last time.”

Lexa blinks. “I would not have -”

“I know,” Clarke smiles, and Lexa curls unsure fingers around her coffee cup.

They finish their coffees in silence, Clarke charting the way Lexa loosens over the course of half an hour. By the end, the weight has lessened on Lexa’s features and the hunch of her shoulders has smoothed. Clarke even manages to coax a small smile out of Lexa with an offhand comment about how she had missed an opportunity to educate her on Claude ‘Okay Guy’ Monet.

“Maybe next time,” Lexa says, and Clarke can hear an actual promise in the words. It makes her smile wider, lift her phone to gesture with it.

“Whenever you’re in town,” Clarke replies. Lexa just dips her head in a nod that Clarke grins at.

When Clarke gets home, she replays the hesitant, “Thank you for agreeing to meet with me,” that Lexa had offered her before she left and shakes her head.

“Thank you for thinking of me,” had been her reply. It had meant to be innocent but her voice had dipped at the end and Clarke flushes at the memory of Lexa’s eyes on her, lips curved in a shy smile. She picks up her phone - thinks of the rocky start that had smoothed into something as simple and natural as the letters with Lexa had become - and taps out a message before going to start on dinner.

**

 **Lexa Natron  
** Text Message  
2015-03-25 8:17 PM

Thanks again for today, and I’m  
sorry again about being late. I hope you  
enjoyed your visit to the MFA, regardless. **  
**Next time I will tell you all about Monet, I promise. **  
** When do you fly back to California?

2015-03-25 10:02 PM

My flight is on Sunday. **  
**Your peppermint candy was more than **  
**sufficient as an apology and I did enjoy **  
**myself. Thank you for this afternoon. **  
** Goodnight.

**

Clarke is a lot more - well - a lot _more_ than Lexa was expecting.

**

The house is silent when Lexa lets herself in. She wants nothing more than to sit in the empty living room with a blanket and enough space to deal with the day: the way she had fractured at Clarke’s question, her rote words not feeling enough like honesty in the face of Monet and Clarke’s nostalgia; the silence over coffee that had felt less like the many forms of sympathy she’d become used to and more like understanding. Instead, she searches room by room for Indra and Lincoln. They’ve been desperately trying to fill a too empty home, and the silence feels heavy without Indra’s music, Lincoln’s clattering (Kostia’s hum of a laugh).

She finds Indra standing at the kitchen counter, hands clenching and unclenching around empty air above a knife and a half diced tomato.

“Indra?” Lexa asks tentatively.

The movement of Indra’s hands still, but there’s no other sign that she’s heard her name. At the sound of Lexa’s footsteps as she comes further into the kitchen, she bites out a terse, “Lincoln is in the garage.”

Indra’s voice is low and on the brink of anger, and Lexa stops several feet behind her. “Can I help with dinner?” she asks, after an uncertain pause.

“No.” It's a blunt, violent refusal, and Lexa nods quickly, her breath stuttering as Indra picks up the knife and runs it through the tomato with enough force to squash rather than slice.

Indra's back is still turned as she leaves, closing the door between them with too much haste to stop it from slamming.

Her dread holds her still on the other side of the door as she tries to regain her breath. Immediately after it happened, she had thought she might be unwelcome here, but this is the first time she’s actually felt it and the distance between the two is stunningly wide.

She hesitates as she opens the door to the garage, but Lincoln is only sitting on the concrete floor, writing on the outside of a box. He starts as Lexa clears her throat, and when he raises his head the lines of the furrow of his brow look as though they’ve been etched permanently into his skin.

“Hi,” Lexa says, sounding too loud for the space. “What-”

“You’ve been sleeping on the couch.” His voice is hoarse. “But we have - we have a spare bedroom for you. Now that we’ve sorted the boxes, anyway.”

Lexa takes in the array of piles she dismissed as garage storage, recognising some of the boxes as the things in her apartment that she sent months ago by FedEx just to get them away. Sorting through it must have taken all day; she’d barely looked at what she was packing, and her stomach twists with guilt. “I would have helped,” Lexa says, after a thick silence broken only by the sound of Lincoln taping up the box.

“We didn’t - we only meant to sort through the books. Then Mom. She said it was stupid for you to still be sleeping on the couch and started shifting things into the garage. We didn't have the space for the car and everything, so we were throwing stuff into bags,” Lincoln says, grunting as he picks up the box and takes it over to put on top of a careful stack by the side of the wall. “Some things for thrift stores, some things for the garbage. That box of books you wanted to take to the hospital. She’s making dinner now. I’m just… finishing up so we can get the car back in.”

Lexa watches him turn and survey the rest of the garage. It looks like there’s more than enough space for the car now. He’s still looking at the space like he doesn’t know where to start. “Can I do anything?”

Lincoln turns back to her, looking at her carefully as if assessing her strength before he nods to an open, unmarked box to one side of the room. Lexa’s heart quivers in her chest, but she forces herself away from the wall to sit on her heels next to it. She stares at the cover of the photo album that she’d made Kos for her birthday last year before picking it up out of the way.

Lincoln comes to squat by her side, taking the photo album from her and watching her sort through the rest of the contents with careful fingers. A lot of it is hers - a pair of shoes Kos had stolen from her, a book she’d lent her on post-war Romania. Kos’ laptop and phone. A few diaries tied together by an elastic band. She can feel Lincoln’s eyes on her, and when she happens upon a shoebox of ticket stubs, his arm is around her shoulders before she realizes there’s a sob caught in her throat. She rocks back on her heels, further into Lincoln’s arm, staring at the pile of - honestly, to anyone else it would be a box of crap, but it’s _their_ crap - the ribbon from a giftbox of party poppers Lexa had bought her as a joking celebration of the first time Kos had ever eaten at McDonalds, the bottle cap they’d spent three hours trying to Macgyver out of the hose of their vacuum cleaner, birthday cards, Christmas cards, and what looks like it must be tickets to everything they had ever attended.

“We thought you’d want to take these things back with you,” Lincoln says.

“Thanks,” Lexa manages, her hand shaking as she picks up the stub to an outdoor laser tag game.

“Yeah,” Lincoln says, and when she looks at him he somehow conjures up a smile. “She kicked my ass.”

“Sure did,” Lexa agrees, and the laugh hurts as it’s pulled from her chest. “She was so conniving.”

“Pure evil,” Lincoln agrees. “We were too busy trying to beat each other.”

“She just found a ditch near the path, covered herself in leaves and waited.” Lexa had been so sure that her archery skills would translate, so sure that she’d bought the tickets partly to show off, still stuck on trying to impress someone who had later told her she’d been ‘silly, but cute’ which had really not been what she was aiming for.

“Your face when she downed you,” Lincoln laughs. His smile fades into something more honest, and the strain of trying to hold it in place falls along with it.

“At least I didn’t fall into the ditch,” Lexa points out, nudging him in the ribs and feeling herself smile with him as he pokes her right back.

“Oh, no, you were just so furious you lost that you refused to speak to her the whole way home.”

Lexa’s sigh slips out, and she drops the ticket back into the box. “God, I loved her.” It’s a shaky affirmation of something she didn’t mean to say, but Lincoln’s smile doesn’t disappear.

“Yeah.”

Lexa lets her head rest against his shoulder, something in his smile reminding her of the girl she spent hours following around the museum today. Clarke only ever spoke of her father in past tense, but there was a light happiness in the memories she shared that Lexa doesn’t understand how to reach. Her throat is tight, and there’s an edge of anger to every memory in that box.

She’s not sure if she’ll ever be able to get to a place past the fury of _there should have been more_ , but the color of Clarke’s stories seems to indicate that it’s possible. For now, she’s managing to return Lincoln’s smile.

“What about the laptop? Do you want to sell it?” Lexa asks, putting the lid back on the shoebox and rearranging the contents of the box so the laptop won’t get damaged in transit. “It’s not that old.”

Lincoln gives a stilted shrug. “Maybe. But we didn’t want to go through it.”

“You want me to?” Lexa asks. At his silence, she tilts her head to see more than his side profile, but he’s studying the box in front of them.

“Just. You know. For privacy,” he says, still avoiding looking at her.

“Lincoln,” Lexa frowns, choosing her words carefully. “There’s nothing in Kos’ life that she wouldn’t have wanted to share with you. You know she was very open. You can trust that.”

“It was more that -” Lincoln tries. “In case there were things on it that she may not have wanted her family to see. Or… that you wouldn’t have wanted us to see.”

Lexa flushes. “She- I mean.” Lexa stops as the pointed inclusion of her suddenly brings home the full implication behind his words. “Lincoln -- what? We would _never_ \--”

“Right, of course,” Lincoln says, but he sounds skeptical until he catches her eye, and then he looks _relieved_ , and Lexa can feel the burn in her face heat the whole of her chest.

“ _Jesus,”_ Lexa hisses. “I’m in _politics_ for crying out loud.”

“We just thought, you know, that there might be things you’d rather us not see,” Lincoln says gruffly, bringing his other hand up to rub at his neck.

“Wait, _we_?!” Lexa asks, and his arm falls from her shoulder as she jerks away from him in horror. “You and Indra _spoke_ about this?” She’s about to hit him, she’s pretty sure, but when he turns to face her he looks about as mortified as she feels. They stare at each other, both red and struggling for further words, until Lincoln’s face twitches, and then there’s a strangled laugh coming out of her throat, and Lincoln is making a noise that sounds somewhere between a laugh and a groan.

“We were trying to make this _less_ awkward,” Lincoln says, and this time Lexa does hit him, a weak slap in the chest that he only laughs at.

“Yeah, great job there,” Lexa grumbles. “Dirty selfies, _god_ , Lincoln.”

Lincoln makes a noise that can only be described as a giggle, and Lexa rolls her eyes at him.

“Did you want to keep it now that you know it’s safe?”

“Could you transfer any photos to a hard drive for us?” Lincoln asks after a moment. “I can’t even think about sorting through anything else right now.”

“Of course,” Lexa says quietly, the smile slipping from her face. “I’ll organize to bring everything back on my flight and sort through it soon.”

They’re still sitting silently together in the same position when the door opens, and Indra says, “Can I get some help with dinner?”

“Sure, Mom,” Lincoln says, clambering to his feet and offering a hand to Lexa.

Indra’s face twitches, her eyes landing on Lexa and sliding back to Lincoln again. “Not you,” she says. “Go bring the car in.”

Lincoln keeps his hand out until Lexa takes it and uses it to help lift herself from the ground, her knees creaking as she stands. “Sure, Mom,” he repeats, going into the house in search of the car keys.

Indra tilts her head towards the door, and Lexa follows behind her into the kitchen, hands in the pockets of her now dusty jeans.

The squashed tomato is gone, but there’s a pile of herbs in its place, and Lexa picks up the knife, separating the stalks from the leaves and beginning to chop. Indra is silent, and when Lexa sneaks a look at her, she’s watching her rather than attending to the pot of boiling water.

When their eyes meet, Indra makes a noise that sounds more annoyed than anything else, and the knife drops to the counter as she’s gathered into a hug. Her jaw clenches, then loosens as her arm comes up to clasp Indra’s shoulder.

“Today was difficult,” Indra says. She pauses before adding, “There were a lot of things that we needed to go through.” Lexa nods, stepping back and picking up her knife again. Indra goes back to the pot, the air clear between them after a hug that felt like both an explanation and apology.

Lexa was never one for unnecessary bodily contact, and they never used to be huggers; she’s not sure that Indra had ever hugged Kos in front of her, even. She is sure that the brief clasp they’ve started using in greeting and farewell holds an ‘I wish-’ in between them. But it’s settling, somehow, into a new kind of normal.

**

It’s her last day in Boston before Lexa realizes Kos’ books are still in the garage and she has no idea which hospital to take them to. They’re heavy with memories, but Lexa is as comfortable sharing these as she would be sharing anything of Kostia’s, and this, at least, she knows Kostia would have wanted. Considering her track record with Clarke, Lexa sighs - this latest development is unsurprisingly awkward.

**

 **Clarke Griffin **  
**** Text Message **  
** 2015-03-25 10:04 PM

Goodnight, Lexa.

2015-03-28 11:02 AM

Hello. **  
** Which hospital do you volunteer at?

2015-03-28 11:13 AM

Mass Gen.

Thanks.

No problem. **  
**Am I right to assume you won’t answer **  
** if I ask why the sudden question?

2015-03-31 11:37 AM

Yes. **  
**I assure you, you will not require a **  
** restraining order.

Good to know?

_Read 11:38 AM_

**

Lexa winces at Clarke’s last text, sighs again at her clearly failed attempt at a joke and Clarke’s question mark.

It’s a fitting punctuation for most of their interactions thus far, honestly.

**

Nurse Huang stops her on her way to lunch, arms laden with books and a smile on her face for Clarke as she waves her down. One glance at the spines tells her that they’re donations for one of the peds wards. Clarke thinks of the meager collection she’s built for her kids - mostly books from her own childhood, _Clarke Griffin_ shakily printed on the inside - and she reminds herself to text Lexa about those book recommendations soon.

It isn’t until they’ve turned the last corner and Clarke looks from her idle chatter with Nurse Huang that she realizes they’re at the pediatric oncology ward playroom. She blinks back her surprise and looks down at the books in her hands, takes in the covers, worn down but cared for.

“These are for us?”

Nurse Huang nods. “There was a young woman who came in over the weekend and dropped off a box of them.” Her expression turns strangely knowing when she adds, “She said was leaving them for the cancer ward, specifically. Is she a friend of yours?”

It’s a sudden thing, the shy bewilderment that blooms in Clarke’s chest, and her cheeks redden with it. She can only imagine the discomfort on Lexa’s face as she’d tried navigating the maze of the hospital to find the pediatric oncology ward - wonders, exactly, how many things Lexa recalls that she has only mentioned once. The thanks she feels doubles with the thought and Clarke fumbles for an answer to Nurse Huang’s question that isn’t overly effusive.

“I think so,” is what Clarke manages after a while and Nurse Huang laughs at her, more for the way Clarke can’t seem to put words together than anything else. Clarke ducks her head and stares at _The Paper Bag Princess_ like it’s the most interesting thing she’s seen.

“Well, whoever she is, keep her around. The kids will benefit if nothing else.”

“Yeah,” Clarke says. Nurse Huang laughs at her again, loud and happy, and Clarke takes the rest of the books from her arms and shoos her out of the empty playroom.

Later, when she’s sorting through the pile and shelving them by topic and difficulty level, Clarke comes across one book that seems out of place, a hardcover by Oliver Jeffers. The spine creaks as she opens it, the cover practically shines, and she’s bought enough books to know that this one is no hand-me-down relic. The neatly printed ‘Property of Massachusetts General Hospital’ on the inside gives Lexa away, and Clarke feels herself smiling so wide she knows she must look a little silly.

That’s how the kids find her when they come tumbling into the playroom later, shouting her name in excitement and falling to a stop at her knees.

“Story time?” one of them asks breathlessly. Clarke watches as the kids begin to rummage through the shelves, ecstatic to find the new additions and taking apart her careful sorting. She finds herself laughing instead of gently reminding them that books are delicate - especially well loved ones - and she pats the floor around her folded legs, motions for them to take a seat. The kids drop down as one, eager fingers curling over the book in her hands before she shakes them free and opens it.

“This is a story by a favorite author of mine, Oliver Jeffers. It’s called ‘Stuck’. Are you ready?”

The kids chime _Yes!_ in unison and Clarke starts them on their adventure into the tree, finds herself thinking of Lexa and how she would look sitting in the room with her and these brave, sweet children smiling around them.

**

 **Clarke Griffin **  
**** Text Message **  
** 2015-03-31 6:09 PM

Hi Lexa. I hope things are going well in Cali. **  
**I just came back from the hospital and the **  
**nurse at the front desk said a nice girl dropped **  
**off a bunch of books for the pediatric oncology ward **  
** ‘weekly reading club’. Was that you?

2015-03-31 8:26 PM

Lexa?

_Read 9:14 PM_

2015-03-31 9:15 PM

Well, going by your history of refusing to answer **  
**questions when I’m right I am going to assume it was **  
**you. The books are wonderful. Thank you so much for **  
**donating them! And please tell your friend Kostia **  
**(I assume the old ones are hers since her name is on the **  
**inside cover of most of them?) that the kids and I **  
**are extremely grateful for all the new adventures **  
**we’ll be exploring over the next few weeks. **  
** Truly, thank you.

**

The response Lexa is in the midst of typing dies quickly on her fingertips as her phone buzzes and Clarke’s follow up message comes through. She freezes so suddenly her muscles shiver with the effort, and her throat closes, the unexpected slap of the words on her screen making her eyes sting. She blinks and sets her jaw against it, locking her phone and placing it deliberately face down on her desk.

The next evening, when the guilt of not responding has grown worse than the dread, she picks up her phone again. There’s a new message from Clarke that eases the tightness in her chest. She feels the same rush of gratitude as she had in the MFA, Clarke’s stories giving her space to breathe and not think about anything but children making art with fingerpaints and smuggled vegetables.

2015-04-01 4:11 PM

I don’t know how the engineering students **  
**keep coming up with these crazy pranks for **  
**April Fools every year. **  
**(Actually, I do. I live with one.) **  
** Any good stories from UC Berkeley for today?

_Read 4:31 PM_

Lexa hesitates, fingers hovering over the keypad. She almost thinks she could tell her - that Clarke would understand not to mention her name so casually if she dropped into past tense, mimicking the way Clarke had mentioned her father in their first meeting. Her fingers hover over the K, but she can’t write her name when it feels like Clarke is watching and waiting for her immediate response. She misses the distance of time afforded by letter writing, and her eyes land on the stamp book on her desk, still half full.

2015-04-01 4:55 PM

You’re welcome. **  
**The story I would like to tell is too **  
** long to fit on a telephone screen.

It takes her a long time to start writing, and the clock has ticked almost too close towards the last collection of post before she puts pen to paper. Clarke must have had time to practice the way she’d slipped her father into past tense; Lexa can’t find the correct sequence of words to explain, when it’s not the blunt newness of ‘my girlfriend was in a car accident’.

Still, she manages to write her name, ink on paper, and it feels like -- it almost feels like it’s a new kind of start.

**

_Apr 1, 2015_

_Dear Clarke,_

_I am pleased to know that the children are enjoying the books. I’m sure Kostia would be as well. Let me know if there are any particular favorites and I will try to make recommendations along the same vein._

_As ever, my college (along with California more generally) has an obsession with In-N-Out Burgers. This year someone put a poster up on a construction site as though they were planning to open one on campus. There were so many enquiries that In-N-Out had to release a statement. I don’t know what it is about engineering students, but our year’s crop decided to throw a hammer into the works. Literally, into the same building works that now hosts an In-N-Out sign, they threw around ten inflatable hammers. Apparently to ‘speed up construction’. As part of student government I’ve had to speak to several parties about the situation, and I am… unenthused._

_What prank did your engineering students do?_

_Your roommate is an engineer? That must come in handy for assembling flat pack furniture. I have to say that is the one thing that I do not excel at._

_Lexa_

**

A part of Clarke feels like she should have known. The letter comes after the better part of a week spent puzzling over Lexa’s last message. When Raven drops the mail off - _“I thought you and Natron finally arrived in the 21st century. Aren’t you two texting?”_ \- Clarke sees Lexa’s handwriting and feels stupid all over again.

(But also hopeful, mostly stupidly hopeful.)

She tries to keep her exasperation out of her response and thinks she succeeded quite well for how long Lexa made her wait.

**

 _April 6, 2015_  

_Dear Lexa,_

_Thank you again for the books; I assure you they are being put to good use. Also for future reference, when you say you’ll give me recommendations does that mean you’ll go out and buy more books? Because if so, it’s very sweet but please don’t - I seem to owe you for too many things already._

_Despite living with an engineer - if you ever meet her don’t call her that to her face, she prefers ‘mechanic’ for unknown egotistical reasons - I can’t say I can describe what the prank was this year. In any case, it was pretty lame. Let’s just remember when M.I.T. did April Fools right with Tetris on the Green Building, okay?_

_(Actually, no matter how lame M.I.T. was this year we couldn’t have been nearly as lame as Berkeley. I think the only thing I laughed at from your retelling was your lack of enthusiasm...)_

_How are things in California? I hope your flight back was okay and that you enjoyed your stay in Boston. Thank you for taking time out of visiting family to spend an afternoon with me._

_Sincerely,_

_Clarke_

_PS: Are you sure flat pack furniture is the only thing you do not excel at? I have a feeling texting may not be your forte either…_

**

 **Lexa Natron **  
**** Text Message **  
** 2015-04-09 3:11 AM

Hello, Clarke. **  
**Please anticipate a more detailed **  
**response in the mail. **  
** Lexa

2015-04-10 6:34 AM

Thank you for the heads up. **  
** It seems I was wrong about you and texting.

Yes.

**

_Apr 9, 2015_

_Dear Clarke,_

_Texting is fine and has its uses, but I prefer writing letters. I have been enjoying our correspondence so far. There is something restrictive in the space allowed in cellphone screens._

_I can give you recommendations if you would prefer, but as I remember saying to you before, you don’t owe me anything. Those books would just have been sitting in storage otherwise. I’m glad to know that children are getting enjoyment out of them again._

_Do you and your roommate get on well? I lived in dorms for less than a month before Anya - my roommate - became so irritating that I couldn’t stand her any longer. We both moved out and into separate apartments because we hated each other so much, but now that I don’t have to hear her tut at me every time I breathe (apparently it interrupted her studies), we have become close friends._

_I am glad to be back. This is my final term now, which is exciting, but juggling interviews, studying for my exams, and maintaining my other commitments is a challenge I am looking forward to being completed._

_Thank you for showing me more of the MFA while I was there, I hope I didn’t take up too much of your time. It was a nice way to spend a day outside of my family. There are only so many stories about the mating habits of insects I can listen to in one week. It had begun to make me wish I had spent Spring Break in Chicago. (For context, I hate Chicago.)_

_It has really started to feel like spring here. There were flowers blooming outside my window this morning that I had forgotten had even been planted. I hope the weather has started to thaw out a little there, and that everything is going well in Boston._

_Regards,_

_Lexa_

**

_April 15, 2015_

_Dear Lexa,_

_Boston won’t thaw for a while yet, I think; please enjoy the flowers for me. Our apartment doesn’t get much sunlight so we can’t have too many houseplants but once the weather gets warm enough I’ll be able to go to the Public Garden and draw the flowers there._

_Has anyone ever told you you have a habit of dodging questions? You may dodge this one as well but I just thought I’d point it out. I know the Oliver Jeffers book was brand new - if you insist that I don’t owe you anything, you have to stop buying me new things, okay?_

_Raven (my roommate) and I get along like a house on fire. My mother likes to say that Raven is the second daughter she never had; we sure act like siblings enough to make it seem true. I got saddled with her in my sophomore year when she was the only semi-sane person to answer the roommate ad and we haven’t looked back since. I’m glad you and your ex-roommate worked out, she seems like a smart person and she speaks the truth: you do breathe loudly, I could hear you at the museum._

_(I’m kidding!)_

_I’m glad you didn’t end up running to Chicago to escape the insect mating rituals - which sound fascinating, by the way - or else we couldn’t have met up. I remember you said that you have family in Chicago. Are the ones you actually like just in Boston? I can imagine why they’re your favorites if they spend Spring Break discussing insect mating rituals with you (I’m in the sciences so I am not, in fact, being sarcastic when I say this. Please feel free to elaborate)._

_You’re in the home stretch before graduation, now. Full steam ahead!_

_Sincerely,_

_Clarke_

**

As soon as Lexa hangs up, she's hitting a speed dial on her phone and pacing the length of her bedroom as it rings.

“Lexa,” Anya greets her.

“Hi,” Lexa says, breathless, stopping and leaning against her desk.

“You've heard? You got it?” Anya demands, and Lexa's smile widens at the flowers outside her window.

“Yeah.”

“Oh well done, Lexa.” It's a warm congratulations, but moments later Anya’s voice is back to brusque. “I knew you would.”

“Thanks.”

“Do you want to celebrate?” It's a little tentative, not at all a normal part of Anya’s speech patterns, and Lexa doesn't have to think about when the last time they actually went out together was - she knows. It's a sudden realisation, that Anya had lost more than one friend, and Lexa lets the immediate guilt of it fade with the determination to correct it.

“Yes.” She's not sure she can face the crowd of people that will inevitably be at their university bar, despite the fact that it's a Wednesday afternoon. “Come to mine.” She pauses, thinking of what she has in the apartment. “I'll get pizza. Bring wine.”

*

 **Father **  
**** iMessage **  
** 2015-04-16 5:57 PM

The UN have confirmed my place in the internship program next March. I will be in New York from March until June.

_Read 5:58 PM_

**

 **Lincoln Ogeda **  
**** iMessage **  
** 2015-04-16 5:58 PM

I got it!

LEXAAAAAAAAA! Future president of the world!!  
Mom says congrats!

Thanks

Are you celebrating??

Anya is coming over

Good! We're so proud, knew you'd get it!

That's you sorted for next year now right?

Yeah

Totally deserved! :)

**

Anya brings two bottles of wine, one of champagne. The pizza arrives just after her, and when Lexa comes back after tipping the delivery boy, she’s already flipped the channel to MSNBC and poured two healthy glasses of champagne. She gives her a toast that ends in laughter when Lexa breathes in the bubbles, and they settle back into a comfortable pattern of fighting over every news story. Their knees knock together as Lexa reaches for pizza, and it’s been so long since she's had anything to drink that she can feel the champagne almost immediately, warm and fizzing through her brain.

Half way through the Last Word, Lexa catches Anya grinning into - oh god, are they out of wine? How did that happen? She cuts herself off mid-rant about EPA’s proposed power plant rule, nudging her shoulder against Anya’s. “Hey. Thanks for coming over.”

“Any time,” Anya says, legs tucked up beneath her and half-resting against Lexa’s side. “When I start getting post grad acceptance letters, I expect Chinese.”

“Deal,” Lexa says, tugging on the lock of Anya’s hair that she’s been playing with since before Rachel Maddow came on screen. They probably should not have started drinking before primetime.

“And vodka,” Anya adds, after a thoughtful pull on a bottle of beer that Lexa didn’t even know she had in the house.

“Okay.”

“And you to admit I’m right about Bernie Sanders running for democratic candidate.”

“Don't push it, Wamplei,” Lexa tells her, tugging again on her hair and laughing when Anya jerks away from her to yell at the TV, almost throwing her bottle in response to something a guest has said.

**

Lexa wakes up with a mild headache, but when she comes through to the living room, Anya is scowling on her couch like she wants the world to stop, and that’s enough for her to give an unnecessarily happy, “Morning.”

“Fuck off,” Anya says, heaving herself to her feet. “I have class at eleven, but I need breakfast and Tylenol before I can drive.”

Lexa narrows her eyes in thought. “Cold pizza, or potentially out of date granola?”

Anya groans. “Please tell me you at least have coffee.”

Lexa does not, in fact, have coffee.

They duck down to the shops and Lexa buys enough groceries for breakfast and to fill her fridge. Anya raises her eyebrows at the amount of restocking she’s doing, but when Lexa starts making them both a full hot breakfast, she doesn’t complain.

Anya’s reading the morning newspaper when Lexa brings them both in a plate of slightly messy eggs and bacon. There’s a few uninteresting looking letters from the bank Anya had picked up with the paper sitting next to her elbow, and Lexa is mid-bite of tomato when a handwritten envelope is pushed towards her.

Lexa’s eyes narrow at her, but Anya hasn’t taken her eyes from the paper, so she reaches out to take it.

“Who’s it from?” Anya asks, and for some _ridiculous_ reason, Lexa can feel herself flush.

“A friend,” Lexa says, putting it to the side and concentrating on her food.

“Do you have a penpal?” Anya asks, drawing out the word mockingly in a way that has Lexa glaring at her.

“I regret giving you my Tylenol.”

Anya smirks around a mouthful of toast, and Lexa makes her wait, finishing her egg. “Yes,” she says eventually, with as much dignity as she can muster. “I have a penpal.”

“Seriously?”

The mocking edge has disappeared enough for Lexa to shrug, squirting some ranch dressing on a cold slice of pizza in a way that makes Anya wince in disgust. “We met in Boston. And... bonded.”

Anya gives her an entirely incredulous look. “You bonded.”

Lexa scrapes fork marks into the remains of her egg yolk, taking a bite of pizza to prolong the decision of what to say in response. She’s still not sure what she’s going to say when she swallows, but what comes out of her mouth is quiet honesty. “Her father died.”

“Oh.” Anya’s head is back behind the paper when Lexa looks up at her, and she passes over the politics section after a few minutes of silence.

Lexa is half way into reading an article on Bernie Sanders’ urging Hillary Clinton to fight Obama’s trade deal when Anya says, out of nowhere, “I’m glad.”

“Hm?” Lexa asks. “Notice how there's nothing in the paper about Sanders running?”

“There's still time, Hillary only announced four days ago. I’m glad that you’ve been talking to someone.”

Lexa looks up from her article to find Anya watching her, a small crease of worry between her eyes that Lexa flicks with the top fold of her paper. “I'm fine.”

Anya puts the rest of the paper down on the table so Lexa can feel the full effect of her glare.

“I- yes,” Lexa says, reaching for something past ‘I’m fine’ that doesn’t drag out honesty over bacon and eggs and a hangover. “I've got someone to talk to.”

There’s a flash of hurt on Anya's face that she doesn’t quite hide in time. Lexa’s not quite sure how to explain it to herself, much less Anya, but for that, she tries.

“The person I’m writing to didn't know her. It's- simpler.”

Anya nods once. “You know that-”

“Yes,” Lexa interrupts, and Anya nods again, her eyes falling back to her plate. A silence falls over the table as Anya finishes her breakfast, Lexa frowning at the paper.

“I can drive now,” Anya announces, standing from the table.

“Excellent,” Lexa says, looking up to find the same twist to Anya’s face that had been between them since the accident.

For once, Anya puts words to it. “She would’ve been so proud she never would have shut up about you. It would have been disgusting.”

Lexa exhales, stacking the plates, and Anya clasps a hand on her shoulder before turning to leave. She’s almost out the door when she says, “Study group tomorrow. Don’t forget.”

“I’ll be there,” Lexa promises, hearing the door click and reaching to open Clarke’s letter, the weight of Anya’s words still heavy on her as she reads it.

She takes it through to her desk, picking up her pen and tapping it on her notepaper as she considers her response.

She could talk about Lincoln and Indra without explaining who they were to her, who _she_ was to her. She could, and it would be safe and it would be easy. But there’s a remonstration about her closure in Clarke’s writing, and an opening that feels like an offer. She doesn’t want to talk about the end she sees in the words Anya’s been biting back, in the empty vase above her wine glasses, but she doesn’t want to scrub her life clean of her death, either, not if it means erasing her entirely.

She thinks of Lincoln’s smile when he talked about laser tag, the shine of Clarke’s eyes and the depth in her voice when she spoke of her father and the ocean, and she looks at the mass of pink and yellow tulips outside her window.

Maybe it’s time that she stops dodging questions; maybe it’s time she stops dodging Kostia.

**

_Apr 22, 2015_

_Dear Clarke,_

_I have only been to the Public Garden once or twice but it was beautiful every time. Perhaps you can share some of your sketches from there the next time I am in Boston, if you would like? I would draw the flowers outside my apartment for you, but as a critical art consumer you may not appreciate the end result._

_I have been informed that I do not answer questions well before, yes. Perhaps it is the amount of time I spend studying politics. I will try to answer in a more forthright manner in the future._

_My parents are in Chicago. I would have had less insect talk there, but my girlfriend’s family makes home cooked meals, so Boston is preferable. Lincoln is as much a sibling to me as it seems Raven is to you. He is in the science of insects, which I was not aware was such an expansive field until I met him. I am not well versed on the particulars, but he studies the way that insects (a kind of beetle?) have affected the evolution of trees (one type especially but I am not sure of the name). You would like him, I think. He has notebooks and notebooks of sketches of the critters he’s studying._

_Speaking of which, his birthday is coming up soon. As an artist, do you have any recommendations for drawing materials? He mostly uses an ordinary set of pencils, I believe, and I would like to get him something better._

_I promise that this is not a ruse to buy you anything further._

_Regards,_

_Lexa_

_P.S. I received my last confirmed internship for next year, which I am looking forward to. How is your exam preparation going?_

_**_

Of all the things to focus on, it’s the word _girlfriend_ that holds Clarke’s attention. She’s not sure if it’s the blotch on the tail of the g - like Lexa had forgotten to lift her pen as she’d rounded out the letter - or just the _girl_ in general. Her mind recalls the smooth curves of Lexa’s forehead, the fullness of her lips, and suddenly she’s thinking of a someone else equally soft kissing those lips and pressing their foreheads together as they part.

The thought is fully formed before Clarke can stop it, and she flushes bright red, a hot thing that travels from her neck up past her cheeks to the tips of her ears. She’s never been so glad Raven isn’t home. Clarke clears her throat and tears her eyes away from _girlfriend_ , focuses instead on the fact that Lexa has an internship.

If she has to pause several times during the letter to push down the urge to ask Lexa a question she’s sure is intrusive, it doesn’t show in her response.

**

_April 28, 2015_

 

_Dear Lexa,_

_First of all: congratulations! The internship is such excellent news. What’s the job? Where will you be jetting off to? You must be so excited to have something lined up already for post-graduation. Have you done anything to celebrate?_

_(I realize as I reread what I just wrote that that was a lot of questions in a row, but I guess I’m giving you something to practice being forthright with. I have faith in you.)_

_Lincoln sounds like an amazing semi-sibling to have. I think I would like him too, not only for his artistic talent but also just that he studies such an interesting subject. I may not be too good with insects in the apartment, but I can definitely appreciate them in their natural habitat and how important they are for the stability of the world around us._

_Does Lincoln exclusively use graphite pencils for his work? The carbon pencils made by Wolff have been working wonders for my sketchwork but it’s more conducive to a broad stroke style and smudging and less for the detail-oriented work that he would do for his species documentation. If he does any sketching outside of just insects, I would recommend getting him the Cretacolor Black Box. It’s been a staple of mine since the early days and it looks great as a gift. Faber-Castell also has some great things including their Pitt pens and watercolor pencils if you’re looking for alternate media._

_I hope I was at least somewhat helpful. Let me know what you end up choosing and if Lincoln likes it. I could use a little pick-me-up in the next few weeks because my exams this semester are going to be brutal. Here’s to hoping I’ll survive._

_Sincerely,_

_Clarke_

**

 **Anya Wamplei **  
**** iMessage **  
** 2015-04-29 9:55 PM

 

Good evening **  
**I hope you’re watching the news **  
**[http://www.cbsnews.com/news/bernie-sanders-to-challenge-](http://www.cbsnews.com/news/bernie-sanders-to-challenge-hillary-clinton-for-2016-nomination/) **  
**[hillary-clinton-for-2016-nomination/](http://www.cbsnews.com/news/bernie-sanders-to-challenge-hillary-clinton-for-2016-nomination/) **  
**I expect a profuse apology and acknowledgement **  
**of my superiority **  
**Keep an eye out on[www.berniesanders.com](http://www.berniesanders.com)  
But don’t worry, you’ll be the first to hear it **  
** I’ve already signed you up for his mailing list

‘As a self-identified democratic socialist, he plans **  
**to run to the her left’ **  
**a) That typo is offensive **  
**b) He is only running in order to shunt Hillary **  
**further to the left, which is an argument that **  
**I think you will find I made to you **  
**c) You are an

a) I know you’re only using emoji because of my **  
**dislike for them. I will take that as a concession of **  
**defeat. **  
**b) Let’s hope you learn a thing or two in Washington. **  
** c) Ad hominem attacks are a sign of a weak stance, Lexa. 

  **  
****  
**Ad infernum with you **  
**

**

 **Lincoln Ogeda **  
**** iMessage **  
** 2015-05-01 12:28 AM

Hey, Mom wants to know if you’re coming **  
**to visit us before you go off to start your **  
** internships/global domination plan?

I’d like that. **  
**I will book flights today. **  
**While I have you, could you remind **  
** me what exactly you do for work?

Why? Who are you talking to me about?

Never mind

Are you going around ruining my life by telling **  
** all your hot friends I’m a bug nerd again?

I would never

LEXA NATRON.

I was trying to explain your job description and could **  
**only remember a green beetle and something about **  
** trees, but not with the correct context.

Ok I’ll give you that. That’s way better than most of my friends. **  
**I work in the natural resource department of Cornell, **  
**as a research biologist. I study the forest stand **  
**dynamics of invasive non-native insect pest impacts, **  
** and help to prepare strategies for biological control.

Thanks. **  
** Bug Nerd.

Jerk.

**

_May 1, 2015_

_Dear Clarke,_

_Thank you very much for your kind words, and the helpful information for Lincoln’s gift._

_To answer your questions in order:_

  1. _The internship is with the Department of Peacekeeping Operations at the UN (I am fairly excited about this.)_

  2. _I will be ‘jetting off’ to the very exotic location of New York. I also have another internship lined up with the International Rescue Committee in Washington - I will be headed there first, actually. After that, I will be travelling overseas to volunteer in some capacity. I am not yet decided on the location._

  3. _Anya and I celebrated with champagne and pizza. Now that I think of it, that could be seen as an odd combination. It was, nevertheless, one of the more enjoyable nights of my year._




_I have clarified what Lincoln does for your interest: he is a research biologist, studying the forest stand dynamics of invasive non-native insect pest impacts, and helping to prepare strategies for biological control. Luckily Lincoln only ever brings home drawings and not live subjects these days. I have heard stories from when he was a child that, were he to try now, I would disown him immediately for._

_I have looked into your gift suggestions, and the Cretacolor Black Box looks very nice. His birthday isn’t for another few weeks, but I will let you know if he likes it (I am sure he will)._

_I have been working on some form of advanced caffeinated autopilot for some time now, but I am lucky to have good friends to help maintain my determination when it flags. I hope that on those days when your exam stress is too high, you can trust that your friend Raven will similarly be there to help you keep up your motivation._

_I have tried to be forthright in my answers so that you did not misplace your faith._

_Good luck with your exams._

_Lexa_

**

_May 1, 2015_

_Mother/Father,_

_Please find the enclosed tickets to my departmental commencement ceremony. I am required to RSVP so please let me know if you will be able to attend._

_Regards,_

_Lexa_

**

It starts out with Clarke dodging Nurse Huang’s teasing. She’s gathered the kids around, bean bag chairs in a loose circle and a book carefully picked from the shelves in each of their laps when Nurse Huang pops her head into the playroom.

“Do you have a minute?”

Clarke raises a finger. She starts the kids on their first pages, reminds them to try asking each other for help sounding out words instead of just skipping over them. The hand she runs through Johnny’s hair is careful and he smiles up at her. Nurse Huang has a matching smile for her as she approaches.

“What’s up?”

“We have a couple of toy donations at the front desk that we’re going to distribute around the different wards,” Nurse Huang says. She nudges Clarke with a friendly elbow. “Since I like you, you get first pick.”

“Thanks,” Clarke drawls. She dodges another elbow to her side and laughs a little, sets an easy pace for their walk to the lobby. Neither of them say anything until Clarke catches the way Nurse Huang is eyeing her and she narrows her eyes. “What?”

“Nothing,” Nurse Huang grins. Clarke purses her lips, waits a beat. She doesn’t even have to ask before Nurse Huang says, “I wonder if the generous benefactor behind this donation is your lovely _friend_ from before.”

The flush that races across her cheeks is hot and blotchy - as the uncontrollable ones always are - and Clarke struggles to find a decent rebuttal. She’s halfway through the L before she realizes her mistake. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Lexa never said anything about toys.”

“Oh, her name is Lexa!” Nurse Huang crows. The grin on her face is impossibly wide and Clarke is sure it’d grow right off her face if it could. “That’s a beautiful name.”

Part of Clarke wants to give in, to tell Nurse Huang about the rivets of Lexa’s braids, the way her lips curve against a weight that Clarke holds in her chest, too. The other part of her thinks of the newness - the starts and starts and starts, they haven’t even reached a middle yet - and the words disappear the same way they had when Raven had asked, when her mother had teased. She focuses on flipping up the flaps of the box she’s finally reached instead and pulls out a stuffed octopus in place of answering.

Later - she uses the excuse of paperwork, cheeks still red in retreat - Clarke is making her way through the ER waiting room when she pauses at the sight of a nurse and the little girl he is kneeling in front of. A cup of water sloshes between them as small hands push it away.

“No.” The girl is shaking, silent, quivering tears dripping onto her knees. The nurse tries to calm her but she won’t - can’t - listen. “No. I don’t - I don’t want it. I want my mom. Where’s my mom?”

The nurse slowly explains that her mom is just behind that curtain over there, that she’ll be back out very soon and it’s best if they just sit and wait. Clarke watches as the girl shifts like she wants to slide off of her plastic chair, and the nurse places a hand on her knees to stop her.

“Things are going to be okay,” the nurse says gently. “We only have to wait a little bit longer, I promise.”

“How do you know that?” the girl says. She sniffs, wiggles in her seat until the nurse takes his hands away, and she stares at him with wet, baleful eyes. “How do you know my dad’s going to be okay?”

The words shouldn’t have carried across a room. They’re a fearful whisper that barely leaves shaking lips but Clarke hears them as clearly as if they’d been dropped into her own ear and her throat closes.

_(“Is Dad going to be okay?”_

_Clarke is small, too small for the plastic chair she’s sinking into. Her mother’s arms are tight around her and Callie’s hand is steady on her knee but Abby doesn’t say anything. Clarke burrows into her mother and shakes and shakes and shakes.)_

The nurse doesn’t get a chance to answer as the squeal of alarms and frantic shouts of _codebluecodeblue_ erupt from behind the curtain. The nurse moves to stand, an automatic reflex to respond to the code, but the girl buries shaking hands in the starched cotton of his shirt and pulls, tugging him down.

“Honey, I need to - “

“Is that my dad?” the girl gasps. She’s frantic, tears and choking cries curling her fingers tighter. The nurse freezes midway to his feet. “Is that my dad? What’s happening?”

The nurse struggles to find words that are soft enough despite the urgency, to not pry the girl’s fingers from his shirt so he can do his job. Before she can stop herself, Clarke is moving - the room is a chasm, a marathon of steps that each press at a dull thing between her lungs - and she comes to stand beside them.

“Let me help,” she says. The nurse gives her a grateful look after he sees her volunteer badge and quickly slips away.

When Clarke turns back to look at the girl she finds wide, tear-stained eyes staring up at her. Underneath the immediate fear and grief is a sting of betrayal that twists harsh and it makes Clarke tense. The girl says nothing.

“Is it okay if I sit here?” Clarke tries eventually. The girl hiccups. Clarke considers kneeling down, folding the girl into a hug to ease the pain gripping her small frame, but she thinks better of it and waits until the girl nods before she settles onto the seat beside her.

“I’m Clarke,” she offers. After a span of quiet - the alarms and overlapping shouts from behind the curtain have petered out to leave urgent murmurs in their wake - Clarke adds, “What’s your name?”

There’s a long, long pause. Clarke waits patiently, grapples with the hurt beneath her ribs until she’s pulled back by a quiet: “Adanya.”

“That’s beautiful,” Clarke says. Adanya ducks her head, pulls her chin down until it touches her shivering chest and mumbles a string of words into her shirt. Clarke spends several moments drawing them back out before she understands, but when she does, the dull ache between her lungs turns sharp, a rusted thing that tears right through her.

“My dad named me. He says it means I’m his little girl.”

Clarke stops breathing. Her shoulders lock, they shake and pull at her back until she’s ramrod straight, and her fingers feel like phantom things she’s lost to the churning in her chest. For a long while, all Clarke can do is try to force air into her too-small lungs; it’s only the sight of fresh tears on Adanya’s cheeks that keeps her trying.

_(“What does Clarke mean, Daddy?”_

“ _It means we love you, baby girl.” Jake smiles so brightly down at her, Abby silhouetted behind him by the hallway lights. Clarke is four but she knows she will remember this: the blue of her father’s eyes, the give of his cheeks as she presses them between small hands._

“ _Love you, Daddy.”_

_Jake drops a kiss onto each palm before tucking them back under the covers._

“ _Love you always, Clarke.”)_

Clarke breathes. Her lungs re-inflate, buoyed by her father’s smile and her mother’s unwavering strength. _Love you always._ Clarke breathes.

After twenty three counts of in, twenty three counts of out - Adanya watches, tear filled eyes big and curious - Clarke fishes her voice out from just beneath the pit of her stomach and says, “Do you... do you maybe want to share some stories?”

Adanya looks at her, scrubbing her eyes with fists that come away wet. Clarke flexes her fingers until they feel real again before slowly bringing her hands up, letting them hang hesitantly between them with her palms up.

“Come on,” Clarke says. She wiggles her fingers invitingly, tries to keep her hands from shaking too much. Adanya stares at her for a long time until something in her settles and small fists unfurl to touch palms with Clarke.

(She used to be those small hands, tiny in her dad’s. Now her hands are grown and Clarke hopes she’s enough to be her father’s daughter, to be the solid ground for shaky feet.)

“Do you want to start or should I start?” Clarke says. Adanya sniffs, considers. After a pause she says:

“I’ll start.”

Adanya’s story comes in spurts; Clarke coaxes her with hums, careful exclamations of encouragement when Adanya’s voice shrinks. Soon, Clarke is learning of the time Adanya’s mother - a hotel chef who makes ‘the bestest grilled cheese sammies’ - came down with the flu, leaving a father and his mischievous daughter on their own in the kitchen.

“Then the soup as-ploded,” Adanya recalls. The tears are drying now, and Clarke rubs her thumbs over the back of Adanya’s hands as Adanya sniffs and sniffs again. “It went all over the kitchen.”

“That sounds like fun.”

“It was,” Adanya says. She studies the contrast of her hands in Clarke’s before quietly confessing, “Mom said the soup was yummy but Daddy and I know it wasn’t. Orange juice was a bad idea. Too sour.”

Adanya scrunches her nose at a remembered taste and Clarke feels the ache in her chest shedding its jagged edges, smoothed by the smile she offers and the responding one from Adanya. She’s about to ask whether they ended up finishing the soup when the curtains Clarke has kept at the corner of her vision wrench open, and a woman who must be Adanya’s mother searches the room until her gaze lands on them.

“Baby girl?”

Adanya snaps up at her mother’s voice. Clarke can see the way Adanya’s mother cycles through surprise and distrust to land on curiosity as she catches sight of their joint hands. Clarke offers a hesitant smile that is only half returned as Adanya slips away from her and bounds to her mother, lifts her arms so she’s hoisted up onto her mom’s hip even though she’s a little too big for that.

“Is Daddy okay?” Adanya asks in a rush. Adanya’s mother gives her a watery smile, presses a kiss to Adanya’s cheek.

“He’s better now. He’s not in pain anymore.”

“Can I see him?”

“He’s -” Adanya’s mother stops, closes her eyes and takes a deep breath that Clarke sees more in the rise and fall of Adanya on her hip than anything else. “In a moment, baby girl. Why don’t you tell me about your new friend first?”

Clarke pushes to her feet at the cue and gives a hesitant smile. Her fingers fumble over her volunteer badge. “Hi. I’m Clarke. I volunteer at this hospital. Your daughter was just keeping me company by telling me some funny stories about her father.”

“Was she?” Adanya’s mother says. She can’t seem to manage more than a tight smile even as Adanya nods vigorously and Clarke doesn’t miss the pained flinch at the word ‘father’. Something in the rigidity of her posture tugs at the edge of a memory that makes Clarke swallow, makes her excuse herself before the memory can fully unfurl.

_(“Clarke, honey, Daddy is -” Abby chokes, tries again, “My Jake is -”)_

Clarke only makes it several steps away before Adanya begins to cry, her mother’s voice cracking against the heartrending wails of her daughter.

“Honey -”

“Daddy’s just sleeping, isn’t he? He’s just sleeping!”

“Oh, baby girl.”

Clarke tries to outrun the words - she’s heard them before, _I’msosorryhoneyI’msosorry_ \- and the last thing she catches before she turns the corner is:

“We have to go say goodbye to Daddy now, baby girl. We have to say goodbye.”

Clarke swallows the sob that crawls up her throat. She knows she won’t finish her paperwork tonight - knows she needs to go home, that she can’t stay here a second longer. There is something old tearing open inside her chest.

Nurse Huang calls out to her as she barrels by. She hears the voice but none of the words and Clarke doesn’t bother to respond as she rushes out of the hospital; she wouldn’t be able to speak, anyway.

Her day starts with dodging Nurse Huang’s teasing. It ends with her sitting numbly on the subway ride home, eyes wet with tears she thought she’d already cried out.

**

“ _This is Abigail Griffin’s phone. Please leave a message after the tone and I will return your call as soon as possible.”_

“Hi, Mom. It’s Clarke. I know you said you won’t be back until the end of the week for the conference, but -

“I just -

“You know what, don’t worry about it. I just wanted to - It’s okay. I miss you, Mom. Dinner when you get back? Love you.”

**

“Clarke,” Raven calls from the kitchen. The smell of the roast fills the apartment and Raven’s stomach growls in anticipation. She checks the oven timer again and pulls out the garlic bread before yelling, “Clarke!”

When Clarke doesn’t answer, Raven makes her way to Clarke’s room, knocks once. The door creaks open under her knuckles and she peers in, eyes slowly adjusting to the dark.

She finds Clarke curled on top of her covers, fast asleep in the clothes she wore to the hospital. Lines of exhaustion that Raven hasn’t seen before cut across Clarke’s face - they carve worry, stress, a heaviness that Clarke can’t seem to shake even as she sleeps - and Raven sighs, closes the door quietly behind her. She reaches for a Tupperware to set aside Clarke’s portion before making a plate for herself and settling down on the couch.

Later, as she washes her one dish and wipes it dry, she thinks of how Clarke hadn’t even stopped to say hello when she had come home earlier in the day. They’re not co-dependent in any sense of the word, but they’ve always been good with the little things, letting each other know when they’re home, making sure no-one misses a meal. Raven feels a twinge of worry bubble up but she pushes it aside, shelves it for tomorrow morning.

She leaves a bright pink post it note on the tin foil covering the plate of garlic bread and puts a glass of water beside it before she goes to sleep:

_C,_

_I made your favorite tonight but you were sleeping. Garlic bread is in here, meat and veggies are in the fridge. Don’t say I never did anything for you._

_R_

The worry bubbles up again when Raven finds the plate unmoved the next morning, the washed water glass the only sign Clarke was there.

**

“ _You’ve reached Clarke Griffin’s cell, I’m not available right now. Please leave a message at the tone and I’ll call you back as soon as I can!”_

“Hi honey, it’s Mom. I just got your call, is everything okay? I’m boarding the plane right now but I’ll be landing in a few hours, I’ll call again then. Love you. Bye.”

**

She tries to sketch flowers after two days of keeping her head above water through nothing but sheer willpower. Classes are ramping up, exams looming, and the busy work keeps Clarke’s mind mercifully occupied. It works well right up until the weekend.

Clarke cancels her volunteering for the first time, tells Nurse Huang she’s feeling under the weather. She packs her bag with her best pencils and the sketchbook she hasn’t had much time to work in and takes the subway to the Public Garden, finds a bench far away from everyone enjoying the first blooms of spring and starts sketching.

She only makes it half way through before the rain starts. It’s a few drops - _she hears her father in them: “A little rain never hurt anyone, Clarke. Maybe it’ll help you grow into a sequoia tree.” -_ and Clarke would ignore it but her lines are smudging and a wave of helplessness crests over her.

By the time she gets home, the drops have turned to a downpour and she’s soaked through. She drips into her room, pushes the things on her desk to the side to make room for her sketchbook to sit and dry overnight. It doesn’t occur to her that she hasn’t responded to Lexa yet until she sees Lexa’s neat writing wink at her as the letter falls to the ground. Clarke bends to pick it up, hesitates before placing it alongside the sketch she couldn’t finish.

There are drop marks across the empty half of the drawing. Clarke doesn’t know which ones are from the rain and which are from the tears she can’t hold back, but she knows exactly which the ones that bloom on Lexa’s letter are.

**

  _[Half finished drawing of the flowers at Public Garden.] ___

**

_May 10, 2015_

_Dear Lexa,_

~~_I don’t want to bother you but_ ~~

~~_So many things have happ_ ~~

~~_I can’t_ ~~

_I told you before to be forthright with me and I think right now I need someone to talk to who will be. I need a way to open up without being overwhelmed. Your letters have been a constant these past few months and I know it’s not fair because you’re extremely busy and you have so many things of your own, but I just -_

_When you said you had a someone, the one you think of when you look at the Monet - you have someone you lost too, right? Someone you’re learning to live without. I thought I’d already learned but it seems I wasn’t very good at it. I need to talk to someone who understands._

_There was something I didn’t say out loud when I told you all those things about my dad at the MFA. My dad died when I was ten. He was an engineer. He went around the world helping people, building schoolhouses and orphanages and hospitals, living spaces for families with no home. Then he’d come back to his home and I thought he’d be safe except one night he went out for a project and walked into a gas leak that exploded and I went from having a family to having just a mom. I love my mother (I can’t imagine the pain she went through in those early years if I had been hurting so much already) but my father was - I lost my father when I was ten and I live with that every day._

_A little girl lost her father two days ago in the ER. I sat in the waiting room with her, held her hands and tried not to let her know that I was probably just as scared as she was and her father died on the bed just a few feet away from us. Her dad was so close and we didn’t even know when it happened. Her mother came out and I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t help the father, I couldn’t help that little girl or her mother, I couldn’t do anything because I was so scared and I didn’t want it to be about my pain and take away from hers and I didn’t know what to be._

_My father used to tell me that I tried too hard to be what I thought other people wanted. He meant that I was perfect the way I was, but I’m not that six year old girl he told that to anymore. I don’t know what he’d say to me if he was here._

_How do you do it, Lexa? How do you keep yourself together so well? I’ve had twelve years to learn to cope and I fell apart at the first hit that was slightly close to home. Do you talk to your girlfriend and her family and Lincoln about who you lost? How do you hold it back and do all of the other things you’ve managed to accomplish?_

_My mom has been everything these past twelve years. She’s been a widely successful surgeon and an amazing mother. She’s been protecting me all this time. I should be the one protecting her, now. I want to talk to her about missing Dad but I don’t know how to do it without crushing her underneath it. Raven knows and she knows loss too, but she has family issues of her own that I don’t want to touch. I just need someone who understands and that I can’t hurt with this, who won’t need me to say the things I’ve said for years with a smile on because I don’t think I can smile right now. You’re so strong, Lexa. I don’t know how you do it._

_When I told you about wanting to be a doctor, the truth of it is that I want to save everyone. I want to stop the sadness, I want to keep families together, I don’t want other little girls to lose their fathers too. It’s naive and impossible but I want to save everyone._

_I’m so sorry for all of this. I understand if you don’t want to write back. Thank you for letting me write it all down anyway._

_Sincerely,_

_Clarke_

**

Raven wakes to the sound of clattering dishes and the faint sizzle of meat on a frying pan. A blinding look at her phone screen tells her it’s barely six in the morning, and she bites back a few choice epithets, drags herself out of bed and into the kitchen.

Clarke is pushing pieces of seasoned chicken, diced peppers and mushrooms around in a pan and idly beating eggs when Raven stumbles into view. The smile she gets is half hopeful, half exhausted. None of it reaches Clarke’s eyes.

“Morning. I was going to wake you when breakfast was ready.”

“It’s not even six,” Raven says. Her voice is scratchy, the threadbare shirt she calls sleepwear useless against the morning cold. She would just go back to bed but Clarke hasn’t let that part-smile fall off of her face yet and it’s starting to freeze on, clashing with the tired lines etched all over her face.

“There’s coffee brewing if you want a cup.”

Raven glances at the coffee machine. “It’s not even on.” She doesn’t miss the way Clarke startles - the smile that’s still stuck in place cracking a little at the surprise - and she continues, “You sure you’re awake, Griffin?”

“Who knows,” Clarke laughs. There’s something sharp and uncomfortable about the sound and Raven waits but Clarke doesn’t offer anything else. When Clarke turns back to the pan and focuses on carefully tilting it, Raven moves closer, notes the way the stove light shines harsh on the stress lines of Clarke’s face and the furrow of her brow. The bags beneath Clarke’s eyes etch dark against pale skin, and the worry that’s been sitting in Raven’s chest for the past few days swells.

“You doing okay?” Raven asks, ever so carefully.

Clarke moves to answer - for a second, Raven thinks that maybe she’ll finally know what’s happening, the reason behind the heaviness that has seeped into the apartment - but then Clarke settles for a smile instead. Raven can see that Clarke clearly isn’t fine, that she’s trying but it’s a tired, strained thing that makes her eyes darker than they already were. If it wasn’t six in the morning and Raven wasn’t exhausted, she’d call Clarke out on it. Instead, she tries for an easy, “You need a break. Why don’t we have a night out tonight, take a breather before exams?”

(If direct questioning won’t work, a diversion should, right? It’s the Reyes motto.)

Clarke shrugs. “I’m not really feeling up to it.”

“What, you don’t think you can handle a couple of shots, a few slices of lime? Come on, Clarke. The alcohol’ll do you some good.”

“I really don’t feel like it, Raven.”

“Don’t be a wuss,” Raven says, “Live a little.” She thinks she’s being nice, that they’re okay and the silence Clarke has been sinking into will maybe give under a few jokes. Instead, Raven finds herself blinking as Clarke jerks around, spatula clenched tightly in a shaking fist.

“I _am_ living, Raven, and I don’t need alcohol to be happy. Some of us are fine without.” Clarke is taut, shaking with effort and the rush of words that have spilled like acid. Raven knows that Clarke probably doesn’t mean anything by it - that she _can’t_ mean anything by it because she _knows_ \- but the implication is still there and she bristles, remembering her mother.

“You got something to say, Griffin?” Raven says lowly.

Clarke scoffs. “Didn’t I just say it?”

“No, come on. You’ve been off for a couple of days now. Just spit it out like a big girl and stop hiding.”

They haven’t fought like this in a while, not since that first summer after they’d moved in together, and Raven feels a hot anger boiling beneath her skin - simmering, too, in a hurt she wouldn’t ever admit. She’s about to say something else when Clarke’s arm catches on the pan handle mid-gesture and the metal flies, omelette splatting onto the ground.

The entire moment collapses in on itself after that, the remains of the breakfast Clarke was making for the both of them giving a last pathetic sizzle against the tiled floor. Clarke opens her mouth once, twice, jaw working to find something to break the silence. In the end, she rounds the kitchen counter and pulls herself onto one of the stools, waits shamefaced until Raven finally joins her.

“I wasn’t - I don’t,” Clarke starts. She stops, tries again but she can’t seem to manage anything other than a crumpled, pained expression. They sit in silence until Clarke stops shaking, and Raven slowly presses a hesitant hand to the curve of Clarke’s back.

“You know you can talk to me, right?” Raven says. The anger that had flared up so quickly falls away and Raven feels the worry that’s been building during Clarke’s self-imposed exile flood in to replace it. When Clarke refuses to look at her, pushing her chin into her chest as she curls further into herself, the worry swells just a little bit more. “Whatever it is, I’m here for you.”

“I know,” Clarke says eventually. She holds a hesitant hand out until Raven drops her free one into it, and they sit like that for long moments, fingers intertwined and clock ticking closer to seven. Clarke’s voice cracks when she finally says, “I’m so sorry for what I said, Raven. I didn’t mean to - I would never -”

“I know.” Raven says. She leans over, presses a kiss to Clarke’s temple before giving their joined hands a squeeze. “I’m nothing like my mom, right? You’re the one who’s always reminding me of that.”

“You are so much better,” Clarke whispers, and for the first time since Raven had found Clarke after she’d cried herself to sleep, Clarke looks something other than drained. “I would never want you to think that you aren’t.”

They lapse into a weighted quiet after that, Raven’s breathing slow and measured until Clarke settles into the same rhythm. She rubs comforting circles along Clarke’s back, waits for the tension to seep away and keeps going even when it’s gone. Clarke tucks her head into the crook of Raven’s neck, and Raven almost misses the words when Clarke whispers them into her shoulder, cracked and quiet.

“I don’t think I’m fine.”

Raven hums. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“I don’t think I can,” Clarke says. “Not right now, at least.”

“Okay,” Raven says. She lets her thumb trail over the ridges of Clarke’s spine, breathing in and out before she tries a sly, “Are you sure you don’t want to go out for drinks?”

Clarke gives a huff of a laugh, “I’m sure, Raven.” It’s exasperated, but there’s a hint of a smile in there too that isn’t some frozen, rigid thing and Raven grins.

It isn’t until later, after they’ve untangled and Raven makes them spicy breakfast wraps - she wipes the remnants of Clarke’s omelettes off the tiles with ease, mimes licking it just to mess with her - that Clarke finally asks, “Can I talk to you later, when I know I won’t say anything stupid or hurtful?”

Raven studies Clarke over her the rim of her mug. She sees the hope and apprehension, the way Clarke won’t quite meet her eyes and the lower lip Clarke worries, and she says the words out loud even though Clarke should already know them: “Whenever you want.”

Clarke seems to sag with relief, and Raven doesn’t let any of her disappointment at Clarke’s hesitance show.

**

“How was French?” Anya asks, not looking like she's moved in the four hours since Lexa left her. Her brow is furrowed and she doesn’t look up from her writing - not that she’d be able to see past the small mountain of rubbish around her if she did.

“Finished.” Lexa tucks the letter she’d picked up on her way through the door under her textbook before making space on the table. “Just Gender and Human Rights left. And P2, if you left completing your distribution requirement until the last minute.” She softens her dig by placing a new coffee in front of Anya, who grunts at her in response. She’s writing out her study notes for what looks like at least the fifth time, cramped, methodical lines on paper the same shade of cream as the exam booklets.

Anya has some odd study habits, and Lexa is already feeling a pang of nostalgia for them. This is the last time they'll sit like this, a mess of coffee cups and take out containers shared between them, Lexa's color coding and Anya's repetitions fighting for space on the table.

“Stop bothering me about my course construction and open your textbook,” Anya tells her flatly. “You might only have one exam left, but the case studies for-”

The beeping of Lexa’s phone as she turns it back on makes Anya stop mid-sentence, looking up from her writing to watch her.

Lexa’s not able to help the sharp spike of disappointment, even though by now she knows better.

“Are they coming?”

“This is just from my internet provider. My parents still have yet to respond.”

Anya nods, looking back down at her notes but not putting pen to paper. “You can come with my family,” she offers after a moment.

Lexa flips open her textbook and concentrates on starting the final read through of the examinable chapters. “It's fine.”

“There's probably still time to get tickets for the Ogedas-”

Lexa's fingers tighten around her pen. “No.” It comes out harsh, and she shrugs to cover the urgency of her refusal with nonchalance. “It's a long flight. And I'm not their daughter.”

Anya taps her pen on the side of her notes and Lexa re-reads the first paragraph four times before the discomfort of 'their daughter won't be graduating' fades from the air in between them.

It's almost eight o'clock by the time Lexa finishes her final revision of her textbook and notes; she still wants to go back over the case studies one more time, but she allows herself the reward of opening up Clarke’s letter.

She swallows after the first sentence, scans the rest of the paragraph and folds it back into the envelope unread, lips as thin as the crease of the paper.

She doubts she can use Clarke’s letter as a reward for anything, when the start of the second paragraph lodges itself as a splinter between every unsteady breath she takes. She stands and goes through to her room, closing her eyes and settling herself. She doesn’t have time for this - not until after tomorrow, when she can finally be done with having to focus on radical historicism and global feminisms and her GPA. She breathes until the hot dread has moved from her chest to her fingers, still clenched around the edge of the paper.

One more day. One more exam.

She puts Clarke’s letter on top of the still unpacked box of Kos’ belongings. _My dad died when I was ten._

“You’ve got a message. Are you ready to go over the case studies now?” Anya calls through, and Lexa turns towards the veiled concern in her voice.

One more day.

**

 **Lincoln Ogeda **  
**** Text Message **  
** 2015-05-13 8:11 PM

 

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJjReLsq5DM>[**  
**](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJjReLsq5DM) Good luck, Lex. May you defeat all of the bananas in your path!

Thank you.

**

There’s a tension that only slides from her shoulders when she walks back into her apartment. The disbelief that she’s written her last final, that it’s over, that she’ll be _graduating_ seeps from her, leaving her proud and empty. She doesn’t have to hold it together any longer. She has a year of focusing on internships: Department of Peace, Department of International Rescue, volunteer work, but that’s focusing on something other than herself. It doesn’t hold the same fear of ruining her own future, more than it’s already been ruined for her.

Clarke’s letter is still on top of Kostia’s laptop - the one she’d promised to sort through more than a month ago, at this point - and she takes both of them over to her bed, fitting the laptop into her power cable and resting her head back against her headboard. She sits cross legged, opening Clarke’s letter as she waits for the laptop to charge enough to boot up. Her thumb peels at the corner of an ‘INCITE!’ sticker on the back of Kostia’s laptop as she reads.

Her eyes burn with the sweeping points of Clarke’s writing; her handwriting is jagged, not curved and even like her previous letters. It’s writing pressed into paper with the force of trying to escape and be felt through the page, and Lexa’s stomach jolts in recognition. The kindling of her pain by someone else’s words is almost - it _is_ a relief. She couldn’t see herself getting to the point where Clarke was in the museum: speaking of her father with a happy nostalgia rather than the ache that thrums through this letter. The Clarke in the museum had felt familiar, but remote; this letter, she recognizes. There are phrases in it that reach deep within her, to reactions she hasn’t yet formed words around.

She puts the letter down to brush tears back into her hair with the heel of her hands, and when she goes back to the beginning, there’s a spark of wonder threaded through the pain of it. Of all the people in Clarke’s life, she trusted this to _her_. Lexa doesn’t know if she’s able to stand up to the false idea of her strength that Clarke seems to have fabricated. But Clarke was there as Lexa broke around a simple question, waited until Lexa gathered herself up again, offered empathy instead of pity. She filled the air with stories that helped Lexa realize that people are more than she expects, and if she lets them help, it _helps_. If Clarke needs her strength, Lexa will find what she can.

The background loads and Lexa’s eyes blur, the pads of her fingers pressing down on the ink of Clarke’s letter. Kostia isn’t with her in the wallpaper; still, she’s not sure she could have faced this alone, and the idea of someone else in the room is almost as unbearable. The weight of the envelope on her knee is a reassurance of distant company that she’s grateful for.

Her own face smiles back at her from Kostia’s laptop in a way that hurts almost more than if Kostia been in the frame with her. Her eyes are crinkled at the corners, a lens flare lighting up the loose strands of her hair, and her lips are tilted with a secret intimacy as she looks at the girl behind the camera. The unfamiliarity of it clenches at her stomach. She doesn’t think her face can find the lines of that expression again. She _knows_ she’ll never again find the trust of it, the _yeah, this is the girl I’m going to marry,_ the belief in forever.

She takes a breath and reaches for the external hard drive, starting to copy across the photographs, one hand firm on the mouse, the other curled around Clarke’s writing.

**

She expects her response to take a long time to write. The packing does take as long as she expects - everything she won’t need for the next year separated and in boxes to send back to her parents’ empty garage, Kostia’s belongings packed in amongst the things she will need in suitcases.

When she sits down on the one piece of furniture she’s leaving in California - a mattress that still has two dips in its coils - the words she’d expected to have to dredge up gush instead, past the ‘ _I’m fine’_ s and the ‘ _my girlfriend was in a car accident’_ s, on to her page with the urgent destruction of seven months of pressure.

**

_May 14, 2015_

_Dear Clarke,_

_Thank you for your letter. I apologize that it has taken me so long to respond. I was not able to give it the attention it deserved until after my final examinations._

_I am glad that you felt able to write about your experiences to me. I hope that it helped. I know that words are not sufficient; ‘I am sorry for your loss’ makes me angry, ‘in my thoughts/prayers’ makes me furious, and ‘in a better place’ makes me homicidal. I will not tell you that I am sorry, or ask if you’re okay (I know that my answer to that question is always yes, especially when it isn’t). I will instead hope to give you some measure of what you gave to me when we were in the MFA._

_People say that anger and depression are stages and eventually it is possible to remember the good things without it, but hearing you speak of your father when we were in the museum together was the first time I have been able to believe it. There have been no stages for me; everything is a mess and it is not clear how I'll feel one moment to the next, much less the next day. You have been dealing with this for far longer than I have, and I don’t know if it will be helpful for you to hear about my experiences in return. But having something (and someone) else to focus on - even if it was just my own entirely inappropriate reaction to a girl drawing me in a semi-inappropriate manner - has been of more help to me than you could know. I would like to return the favor, but this letter is bound to be far less coherent than I usually aim to be. I apologize in advance for that. I am not sure that I am as good at holding it together as you seem to think. There have been a lot of moments - several even in the brief times that I have met you - where I have not succeeded. I’m sorry for how I treated you the first time we met._

_That first day at the MFA, I had just returned from Kostia’s funeral. She was my girlfriend. We were together for two years... and I’m anticipating your questions and answering them before we have to have a conversation about it because that’s what I do now. Try to stop this conversation before it ever happens. I don't remember if I was more forthright before this. All of me has been tangled up in her death for the past eight months, and in her for two years before that._

_The family that I visit in Boston - Lincoln and Indra - they lost their sister and their daughter. Even Anya, who is the only person in my life who was mine before Kostia's, lost a friend. I would not have been able to graduate without them. I'm trying to tell you that you should not be worried that your housemate and your mother are too busy with their own pain to help shoulder yours, but I know that sometimes the people closest to you are the hardest to speak to. I think that is partly why I have been relying so heavily on our correspondence. You are the only person I now know who didn’t know her._

_I met Kostia early on in my first year of college. Few of our friends would have been friends with me if they hadn't been friends with her first. It was easier to let her make friends for me, she was far more likeable than I am. I have been finding it difficult to speak to people who only knew me when she was there. I was a better person before I lost her, and I was a far better person when we were together, and now I don’t think there are many of our old friends who speak to me for a reason other than in her memory. That is difficult to deal with._

_I have been so focused on getting to the end of my undergraduate degree that now that it's finished, I am only just realising that it's not over. I still have to go through the rest of my life like this and now there's no end point in sight. I don't know how to do it without her - I was so sure she was going to be there for the rest of my life. She died four days before homecoming, and we had plans for that and for so much beyond it. We’d talked about what sort of dog we wanted and what we would call it. We knew what sort of house we wanted to live in and where. We'd discussed our career options and compromised until we had our whole lives planned out. I slid her into my plans so easily but it's impossible to just slide her back out. I don't know how to continue our plan without her. I don't want to make a different plan without her in it. I don't want to_ _ be _ _without her._

_It's probably incorrect for me to say the word love in present tense, but it feels so wrong to say loved. It's not that I believe in soulmates or fate. I never used to. But I don't think I can ever be as happy as I was with her. I don't think I have it in me any more, she took so much of me with her when she died._

_It's the what ifs that I find the most suffocating - what if she hadn't loved the drive from New York to Boston in fall. What if it hadn't been almost as cheap to fly to New York instead of Boston and rent a car. What if it hadn't been so long since she'd driven. What if she wasn't so easily distracted by the color of leaves in October. What if I'd just gone with her because then at least even if it still went as badly-_

_I feel like I'm drowning in all of the things I could have done to prevent it and the things we could have done in the future but won't be able to, and I'm just so furious with myself and with her and I don't want to be any more. I'm so tired, Clarke. I want to be able to sit in front of that painting and talk about the time I went to the beach with her without it feeling like there's nothing left of her but this stupid anger and the stupid hope that when I wake up she'll be there and the stupid love that I have for someone that doesn't even_ _ exist _ _any more and the stupid way everything we had and could have had has been ruined by one awful moment._

_I just want her back._

_I want to be able to un-know that everything is so very very fragile._

_I'm sorry, I don't know how to end this. I don't know if this is too much of a mess for you to understand, but thank you for letting me try. I have not really been able to talk about her since. This was probably less helpful for you than I had imagined it would be. Giving you my problems to deal with on top of yours was not my intention. This letter is far too long now so I am going to end it here. But Clarke - thank you. And I do understand. There are days that are okay and there are days that are just_ _ not_ _, and if writing to me about it helps you with them in any way at all then please, do._

_I probably owe you another ten bad day letters after this essay._

_Regards,_

_Lexa_

**

She leans against the postbox for a good minute, expecting to find the courage for her fingers to stop shaking around its edges and let it go.

The letter gets slipped into the side pocket of her carry on instead.

**

Boston still feels like it’s mid-winter, but the sun is bright and when Lincoln grabs a table for them outside of the cafe Lexa doesn’t complain, just leaves her jacket buttoned against the chill. Indra declined to come this morning, her eyes dull from lack of sleep and her voice heavy with closed grief. Lexa would have too, if Lincoln hadn’t been so determined they do something to congratulate her. Kostia was supposed to have been graduating with her today. Even going out for breakfast feels like too much of a celebration but Lincoln had insisted, his face set in a way that Lexa knew far too well to deny.

She’s trying to decide between a smoothie or an orange juice when her phone pings with a message:

_Dear Lexa,_

_We will not be able to make your graduation tomorrow._

_Buy some champagne on us._

Her hand goes to the purse where she’s been keeping the letter to Clarke, and she puts her phone down without answering her father. She thinks again of the way Clarke had talked about hers - a man whose love for his daughter still shone through Clarke's memories - and her stomach clenches with the sudden, dreadful wish that instead of Kostia--

She hates herself for it, looks down at her breakfast menu and blinks back nausea.

Lincoln nudges her foot under the table, and when she looks up he’s watching her quietly, head cocked to the side.

“Mimosas,” Lexa says firmly. “We are getting mimosas.”

“Lex-” he says, his eyes flickering with concern.

She can feel herself redden with the effort of holding everything back, and she takes a breath to calm herself, unlocking her phone screen and pushing it towards him. “He didn’t even care enough to get the date right.” She rolls her eyes as she says it, but Lincoln’s hand nudges at hers as he reads the message. When he looks back at her, it’s with a warm concern that she in no way deserves because now that she’s thought it she can’t stop it: this wish, this horrible, _disgusting_ wish that it had been her father and not someone who actually loved her.

She’s clenching down on everything and the concern on Lincoln’s face devolves into alarm. Her lungs feel too brittle to breathe with until Lincoln’s fingers squeeze hers over the phone. She takes in a hitched gasp of air that’s more sob than breath, and Lincoln is up and out of his chair, abandoning their menus and the idea of breakfast to gather her up and lead her away from the cafe and the people.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have pushed you into celebrating. Your fucking dad,” Lincoln says shakily as he sits on a park bench, dragging her down next to him and keeping an arm solidly around her.

“My fucking dad,” Lexa says thickly, nodding through tears even though they both know this isn’t really about her parents. Lincoln’s eyes are wet when she looks at him, and Lexa lets her head drop back onto his shoulder, taking deep, shuddering breaths until the steadiness of Lincoln’s arm around her puts her back on even keel.

“Sorry,” she says, picking her head back up and shrugging her shoulder up to wipe her eyes on the fabric of her coat. “For ruining breakfast. We should probably head back to your place.”

“Just - give me a bit,” Lincoln says with a choked off laugh. He’s looking out over the pond as he says it, bringing up a hand to brush at his cheek quickly, and Lexa nudges at him until he raises an arm for her to curl back under.

“I’m used to Californian weather,” she says in explanation, but she waits until Lincoln has stopped clutching at the corner of her coat before she makes another move to leave.

They pass a post box on their walk back, and Lexa searches in her bag until her hand finds the letter, already stamped and waiting to be sent.

Lexa can’t imagine what having a father like Clarke’s would have been like, but she thinks it might have been a little like the firm knowledge of Lincoln keeping pace beside her. She can’t begin to imagine losing a father like Clarke’s, and she uses Lincoln’s presence by her side, the curious tilt of his head as he waits for her on the other side of the post box, to gather the courage to slip the letter through the hole to the space between her and Clarke, where she can’t take the words back.

She thinks that maybe this was what her college counsellor had meant when she’d said that writing could help - a fullness of hurt in places that have felt empty.

**

The letter comes on the one day Raven doesn’t pick up the mail. Clarke gets a text just as she passes the mailroom _\- completely forgot i think our hydro bill is in can you check -_ and she reaches in expecting a thin envelope full of numbers. She comes out with a hefty letter and Lexa’s writing burning into her fingertips.

She almost puts it back. It’s a knee-jerk response laced with a child’s notion of invisibility but rational thought is hard to come by when this letter - a response she foolishly thought would never come - now sits tangible in her hands. She brings it up and leaves it under the clutter of her desk, waits until the between hours of night when the city stills beneath her to open it.

She makes it two words in before she folds it up again. The gentle curve of Lexa’s writing around her name presses hard, and she feels her hesitation well in the corner of her eyes. The heel she drives against each eyelid stays dry but just barely.

A second attempt brings her into the first long paragraph. She stutters over every word, loses a bit of breath at each confession of understanding. Her stomach twists at the abrupt realization that she had given something to Lexa in a moment she thought she had been accidentally taking. By the time she reaches _I would like to return the favor_ and _I had just returned from Kostia’s funeral. She was my girlfriend,_ there’s a roughness growing in her chest that Clarke can’t swallow. The heat of tears spills onto her cheeks as she reads _I know that sometimes the people closest to you are the hardest to speak to_ and _I want to be able to sit in front of that painting and talk about the time I went to the beach with her without it feeling like there's nothing left of her._

She hadn’t known. Clarke hadn’t known when she’d written her letter that the weight she had recognized in Lexa had been this, that Lexa would reach out with her own sadness laced with _‘I know, too’_. Clarke had spilled her pain hoping for a sliver of relief and had received far more than what she felt she had any right to; she’s both scared and relieved to sink into it - the carefully scripted words and a closeness unexpected of soft paper and ink.

Later - much later, after Clarke has cried out every tear she can for her father, for Lexa, for Lexa’s Kostia and all the good people who have gone - Clarke re-reads the letter and traces over each of Lexa’s admissions of trust. The pain is still there but Clarke feels emptier now, as if the sorrow had built and crested with Lexa’s words to leave her to start anew. She lies on her bed with the letter draped over her stomach and breathes, and it feels less labored than anything since the day at the hospital.

She doesn’t see the post office stamp until she folds the letter carefully away and her fingers still on ink that spells Boston rather than California. A wet, shaky laugh tickles up Clarke’s throat, thrumming with a warm fondness, and it spreads easily into her fingertips. Clarke shakes her head and murmurs, “Oh, Lexa.”

It’s that smile that greets Raven when she pokes her head into Clarke’s room. Clarke is still staring at the ceiling as Raven approaches. She tilts her head to watch Raven set two glasses of water down onto the bedside table and blinks as Raven leans in to loom over her. Raven’s hair is piled up in a messy bun, sleep shirt falling off of one shoulder.

“What’s with the dopey smile?”

Clarke’s smile deepens. “I thought you went to bed.”

“I was worried about you,” Raven says. She waits with her hands on her hips until Clarke shuffles over an inch or two and pats the space beside her. The letter gets tucked into Clarke’s free side while Raven nimbly settles in, arm running warm all along Clarke’s. For a moment, Clarke thinks Raven will push, that she’ll tug the letter into the open and ask. Instead, they lie in silence and listen to the faint sounds of a sleeping city.

Raven is almost asleep by the time Clarke finds the words. The silence is hers, a wall built by her own reticence, and Raven has been uncharacteristically patient while Clarke had turned inward in hiding. She remembers the sting of her early morning mistake, and it guides her tongue into a conversation that’s days overdue. Lexa’s letter sits comforting in her fingers.

“I’m sorry I’m worrying you. And for how I’ve been these past couple of days.”

Raven hums. Her eyes are closed, and she doesn’t bother to open them. Clarke feels Raven slip a hand into hers and she gives the lax fingers in hers a squeeze. “I watched a little girl lose her father the other day at the hospital. I guess it’s just -” Clarke takes a deep breath. “It’s the first thing to hit so close to home in a while and I didn’t really know what to do with it.”

The words are coming easier now, as though her letter to Lexa had made them more amenable to sound, and Clarke draws strength from the settled distance of her pain.

“It’s weird, I guess, to have something that you thought was fine come back and be anything but. I spent such a long time being okay that when I stopped, I didn’t know what to do. This little girl trusted me when I told her her dad was going to be fine. He coded not even a foot away from us.” A buried fear is surfacing now, words she’s tried to block from her mother becoming harder to deny. “Did I lie to her? I shouldn’t have said anything, not when I don’t have any control over any of it.”

“You did what anyone else would have, Clarke,” Raven says.

Clarke lets out a huff of a laugh, turns onto her side so that she can look at Raven without craning her neck. Raven does the same and their knees press together, the contact grounding Clarke against the doubt that begins to swell.

“I’m trying to be responsible, not just do what anyone else would have. My Dad… he taught me a lot of but mostly he taught me the value of doing what’s right. I miss him,” Clarke says. Her voice cracks a little and the ache grows just a bit. “I don’t know how to really say it but I _miss_ him.”

Raven’s free hand is on Clarke’s face now, fingertips pressing into her hair, and the look Raven gives her is part pained, part obstinate. There’s a ferocity in it that brooks no arguments, and that strength transfers into the press of Raven’s palm. “If I didn’t know you were such a smart person, I’d call you fucking idiotic right now.”

Clarke blinks. It’s not what she was expecting but she doesn’t shrink away as Raven shifts forward. Her words are so low Clarke feels them vibrate in her chest more than hears them. “There is no way to decide what is absolutely right, just as there is no way to tell a little girl that she’ll never see her dad again without feeling like shit.”

“Raven -”

“You never lied to that girl, all right? You told her what you thought would happen and yeah, you had no control over it, but it doesn’t mean you can’t have an opinion. It certainly doesn’t mean you can’t try to make a scary experience for a little girl be something less terrifying. If you think that isn’t the quote-unquote right thing to do, I don’t know what to tell you.” Raven pauses, squeezes their joined hands while she gathers herself. “Stop trying to crush yourself under all that shit and just - just let yourself be. Be sad. Miss your dad. Have those emotions and don’t feel like shit for it. And _talk to us_ , okay? Abby’s been texting me because she’s worried.”

Clarke laughs. The mock affronted look Raven gives her makes her laugh more. “Sorry.”

“Nothing to apologize for,” Raven says, “It gives me an excuse to talk to your mom.”

“You’ve never needed an excuse before,” Clarke says, and she pulls back to give Raven a look. Raven grins and closes one eye in an exaggerated wink before sobering. The kiss she drops onto Clarke’s brow is soft, hesitant.

“This is all you were drowning in, right? There’s nothing else that happened that you might want to talk about?” The naked worry in Raven’s voice sinks low in Clarke’s gut and she shrinks with guilt. ”You had me scared for a moment, you know.”

Clarke has no words that could hold all of the gratitude and warmth she feels for Raven in this moment, so she settles for pushing forward, curling herself around Raven until she feels Raven wiggle in her arms and shift so Clarke’s knee isn’t digging into her stomach. The heat of Raven’s hands settle onto her lower back.

“Jesus, you octopus.”

“I love you, Raven. And I’m sorry.”

Raven huffs. “Whatever, Griffin. Love you too. Now let me go so we can both get some sleep. Breakfast is on you tomorrow morning.”

Clarke laughs as Raven extricates herself and she pretends not to tear up when Raven whispers, _It’s okay to miss someone and let yourself sink into that, just remember you have people to help pull you back out again, okay?_ The words echo what Lexa had written between lines of overwhelming trust, and Clarke wonders if someone else had told Lexa this too, or if Lexa had just known better.

She keeps the comfort of Raven and Lexa in her chest as she picks up her phone to make a long overdue call. When Abby picks up, groggy and slow, Clarke spills everything in a rush of emotion: the story of the little girl, the worry and pain and grief, the fear of being unable to help while hurting those who try to help her. The words flow until just before dawn and Clarke is bone-tired but Abby’s voice is strong in her ear. It all settles when Clarke whispers:

“I miss him, Mom. I miss Dad.”

“ _I know, honey,”_ Abby says, _“I miss him too.”_

She leaves her mother with a promise for dinner soon before hanging up, and the text she manages to send before she falls completely asleep keeps Lexa’s letter company just beside her pillow.

**

 **Lexa Natron **  
**** Text Message **  
** 2015-05-21 4:27 AM

 

I got your letter. **  
**I have so many things to write back to you. **  
**Thank you. I’m sorry. I understand. **  
**You’ve done more than you can **  
**imagine and I am so grateful. I just wish **  
**I could actually write back to you? Your **  
**letter seems like it’s from California but **  
**the post says you’re actually in Boston. I’m not **  
**asking why that is - I get it, the distance written **  
**word gives is so important, especially right now - **  
**I just wanted to know when you’ll be back in **  
**California so I can write back. **  
**Thank you, Lexa. **  
** Your letter means a lot.

**

Lexa is awake before the sun is up. She’s been sleeping better, these past few nights, but the noise of Indra in the kitchen interrupts any idea she has about sleeping in. She reaches for her phone to check the time, blinking with sudden alertness when she sees the name on her screen. She hadn’t been expecting -- she _should_ have been, obviously, because of course the post wouldn’t take as long, but she hadn’t been.

She curls up in the corner of the couch, drawing the blanket around her and tucking it carefully under her feet before she swipes a thumb across the ‘Clarke Griffin Text Message’. Lexa stares at her phone for a long time before responding, her eyes flicking between the time stamp and the words. The idea of her letter keeping Clarke company at that time of the night, when the silence of the world outside is full and heavy and loneliness is always more pressing, has her lips tilting in a small smile. As she types out a response and makes to start her day, the smile stays with her.

The confirmation that she helped Clarke is a relief, but behind her smile there's a safe kind of knowledge that when she gets to Washington - an unfamiliar city and an unknown apartment that won’t feel anything like a home - there will be a letter, soon on its way to her.


	4. i’ll whisk away your heartsigh (and bury it in mine)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Happy holidays, folks!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for bearing with us. As always, thanks to S.H. and dealanexmachina for all of their help and support, as well as everyone who has been commenting/asking questions/chatting to us and helping us along. Happy holidays, everyone - bring on 2017!
> 
> Any art not by Monet or some other famous dude is actually work by the EVEN MORE FANTASTIC MAGICALZEBRA. Hop over to her [tumblr](http://magicalzebra.tumblr.com/) to tell her how amazing she is!!!
> 
> Playlists: 
> 
> aeveee: [Part III](http://8tracks.com/aeveee/letters-burning-by-my-bed-for-you) (previous playlists: [Part I](http://8tracks.com/aeveee/chasing-down-silver-linings-we-are-coming-home), [Part II](http://8tracks.com/aeveee/we-re-just-a-lie-away))  
> scryves: [Arc Two](https://play.spotify.com/user/scryves/playlist/1XoAfDzy417OgXqnjxcSRJ) (previous playlist: [Arc One](https://play.spotify.com/user/scryves/playlist/0q8XWxbLO3FArpd5ZKxpSj))

The bathroom in Indra and Lincoln’s home is too small to comfortably be used as a changing room, but Lexa manages with an awkward hop that wets the hem of her jeans. She comes out of the shower, a towel still wrapped around her shoulders. Indra is waiting for her in the living room with two cups of tea, and Lexa knows exactly what that means even before Indra says, “I need to speak with you.”  
  
The gentle way it’s said eases the dread that clenches in Lexa’s chest at the sight of the mugs. She hasn’t been able to forget the way Indra snapped at her, and from Indra’s carefully soft expression as she pats the couch beside her, Lexa hasn’t been able to hide it either.  
  
“Thank you for the tea,” Lexa says, picking it up and settling on the couch, her elbow comfortable on the blanket folded over the arm.  
  
Indra sips at her tea, regarding her over the top of her mug. “I woke you this morning.”  
  
Lexa watches the ripple of her tea as she blows on it. “I should stay in the habit of waking early, and I wouldn’t want you to alter your routine.”  
  
“You have a week left here before you leave for Washington.”  
  
Lexa reaches for her phone automatically. “I can change my flight and leave earlier. I don’t want to-”  
  
Indra’s glare is fierce, and Lexa stills so suddenly that the sloshing of her tea threatens the lip of her mug. She sits back, leaving her phone well alone. She almost forgot how little Indra appreciates technology being brought into conversations.  
  
“What are your living arrangements this year?”  
  
“Sub-letting apartments in Washington and New York.”  
  
“And in between?”  
  
“My belongings are stored in Chicago,” Lexa says, hands tight against the warmth of her mug. “I can go there if-”  
  
“You’re not going to visit?”  
  
“I would like to, but the length between my internships is indeterminate, so it’s probably best if...” The irritation on Indra’s face stops her, and she puts a hand up to shift the towel from where it had slipped, covering up the now damp part of her shirt. “I would like to, but only if you don’t mind. The house is quite full at the moment."  
  
“Lexa.” Indra puts down her tea, waits until Lexa looks up from the outline of a dung beetle on a coaster Lincoln had carved in high school before she continues. “Lincoln came back home because I needed this house to be less empty. Stay here. You don’t need to suffer Chicago. You’ve got a lot of changes to go through this next year and it’s not good for you not to know where your home is.”  
  
“Oh,” Lexa says, straightening and meeting Indra’s eyes properly. “I-” she stops, unable to put words to the warmth seizing at her chest. “Thank you.” Indra nods. “It would be for less than a month, and I would contribute to groceries and bills of course-”  
  
“Don’t insult me, Lexa,” Indra says, with a hard warning that Lexa only gives a faint smile at. It’s a comfortable, familiar argument that Lexa knows she’ll never win, and she’s fairly sure Indra knows she won’t stop fighting. “But if you’re here for a month then, and another week now, you don’t have to sleep on the couch. The bed in the room is made up for you, and you’re more than welcome to sleep there.”  
  
Lexa takes a swallow of tea to wet the sudden dryness of her mouth. “Thank you,” she says again, with far more difficulty.  
  
Indra stands, clasping at her upper arm, fingers curling in a brief squeeze of understanding. “Whenever you’re ready.”  
  
Hours later, a home cooked dinner turns into a surprise celebration of her graduation when Indra pops some champagne. Lexa sits up late with Lincoln and a second bottle of wine, and when she finally goes to bed, it’s to a room that will always be Kostia’s, but has always felt a little like hers, too.  
  
She’s almost asleep when a quiet rhythm of knocks sound on the wall above her head and she blinks her eyes back open, puts a hand up to cover the sound. Lexa knows that any pattern she could respond with would intrude on an echo she’s sure Lincoln still hears. Her palm stays flattened against the wall, fingers pressing towards him, until she hears a muffled, “Night, Lexa.”  
  
“Good night, Lincoln.”  
  
The cool light of spring filtering through thin rose-patterned curtains wakes her the next morning. The room has been stripped of everything personal, bare in a way that feels new, expectant.  
  
She’s lost so much this year, but there’s a new sort of friendship in the letter still tucked in her purse, and she’s kept a grim hold on the graduation that means her life plan hasn’t been derailed entirely, the tracks bent more than broken. She's kept hold of Anya, eight texts and a missed call lighting up her phone from the table beside her, a level of attempt that she knows, without looking at the news, means Anya thinks she's won another argument.  
  
And she's kept this - been given this: a home she thought she would lose.  
  
**  
  
Dinner with Abby is simple, stories traded over lobster rolls, oysters, and wine. Clarke takes comfort in the richness of the food and her mother’s indulgent smile, laughing when Abby swipes the last lobster roll from the basket and pretends to withhold it.  
  
“I hope you get fat,” Clarke says, sticking her tongue out. Amusement makes Abby’s eyes crinkle at the corners and Clarke finds her chest tightening at the sight of it. The warm feeling drops away when Abby feigns offense and the movement jostles the wedding ring out from beneath her blouse. Clarke’s laughter sticks in her throat.  
  
“That’s not a nice thing to say to your own mother,” Abby grins before she catches sight of Clarke’s expression. Worry creeps into her brow. “Honey?”  
  
“Sorry,” Clarke whispers. The noise of the restaurant around them seems to have dimmed and Clarke takes a breath, slips a loose strand of hair behind her ear before trying for a smile. She isn’t sure if she manages it. “I was just thinking about how much I missed seeing you laugh.”  
  
“And Dad, I’m guessing,” Abby says, looking down at the ring resting just below her collarbones. “You know, I never realized we’d stopped talking about him as often as we used to. When you got really busy with school and volunteer work, I just assumed it was that and not something else.”  
  
“We don’t really have to talk about it now,” Clarke tries, shrinking into her seat, but Abby shakes her head, rests a hand on Clarke’s.  
  
“I’m just thinking out loud. I know how much you hate talking about feelings in public.” Abby softens the jest with smile and Clarke finds herself wanting to speak despite her initial discomfort. She remembers the worry in her mother’s voice, the gentle relief once Clarke had finally started talking to her. The way Abby looks now - half uncertain, half resigned - makes Clarke think of Raven in the darkness of their shared kitchen; she won’t let the moment collapse the same way it had then.  
  
“I know I don’t talk about things - about Dad - with you as often as I probably used to. It’s not that I don’t - ” the words trickle away for a moment in the face of Abby’s eyes widening. Clarke tries again. “I think I did get busy, but I also thought that with so much time, I should have been past all of it. Past all of the talking and the sadness. I guess that was naive of me.”  
  
“Oh, Clarke,” Abby says. The waiter stops by with a dessert menu and an offer to bring another glass of wine but Abby quietly declines, asks for the bill instead. It isn’t until they’ve left, out into the warmth of a late spring night, that Abby finally speaks again. Clarke tries to focus on the way her mother carefully sounds each word, the grounding touch of Abby’s arm looped through her own, anything to undo the knot in her chest.  
  
“You weren’t naive to think that with time things get better.”  
  
Clarke looks up at that, a sharp raise of her chin. Abby seems to be waiting for Clarke to say something - a rebuttal, maybe, another condemnation of her own feelings - but Clarke can’t form the words. Abby looks at Clarke with such fondness that the knot in Clarke’s chest unravels anyway, leaving only an almost pleasant ache.  
  
“Your father used to always say this to me. I never listened to him but after -” Abby swallows jerkily, tries again. “After, I thought about it, and maybe there is no right thing. Maybe there’s only what feels right to you, in that one moment.”  
  
Clarke watches as her mother seems to mull over her words. There’s a stiffness in her expression, a look Clarke recognizes as one that comes with thoughts of her Dad. She’s about to try to reach out to offer comfort when Abby speaks again.  
  
"Time gives you distance. It gives you a chance to breathe and see a situation in a different light, but everyone processes differently, moves through grief differently. Just because it’s been a year, two years, maybe even ten, it doesn’t matter. Where you are and how you get there, that journey is unique to you. No-one else can tell you how to live that.”  
  
Abby gives Clarke’s arm a squeeze then, leans over to pull her daughter in until Clarke can feel Abby’s lips on the crown of her head. “There are no milestones that you have to reach at a given time, no set timeline you need to follow. There are, however, people who care a lot about you that you can talk to whenever you want, and we’ll always be here for you, okay?”  
  
“Okay,” Clarke whispers. The weight of uncertain grief lessens along with the thought of being a disappointment and Clarke clings to her mother’s touch. “I love you, Mom.”  
  
“Love you, too,” Abby whispers back. She wraps Clarke in a hug that Clarke gladly burrows into, giving Abby an extra squeeze before she lets go.  
  
“Will you be okay getting home from here?” Clarke asks once she realizes they’ve reached their splitting point. Abby raises an eyebrow at her and laughs.  
  
“Isn’t that my line?”  
  
“Just stay safe, Mom.”  
  
“Text me when you get home,” Abby says, pressing one last kiss to Clarke’s brow. When she gets back to her room, Clarke thinks of the warmth of her night, gently carves it into the paper. The words flow from her, earnest and hopeful and light, and by the time she’s done, her eyelids are drooping with a pleasant exhaustion. She folds up the letter, slips it into an envelope before crawling into bed, resolving to seal and mail it in the morning.  
  
**

_May 23, 2015_

  
  
_Dear Lexa,_  
  
_I hope this letter finds you well. Washington, was it? You’re going to so many new and exciting places this summer, I can barely keep track. It’s strange writing a letter not knowing where it’ll be flung out to. I have yet to receive your new address but I have so many words that I figured I’d try to get them down now and worry about their destination later. I seem to have an odd trust in our correspondence in that way…  
_  
_First and foremost I wanted to say thank you. Thank you for trying, for reading, for staying even though what I had written was a lot to ask of you. Thank you for understanding and for sharing that understanding. Most of all, thank you for trusting. It means a lot to me that you would be willing to tell me about Kostia; she sounds like an absolutely beautiful human being. I’m grateful to have been able to get to know her even in the smallest of senses.  
_  
_It’s an instinct to try and apologize when you hear of someone’s pain. Even now I’m holding an ‘I’m sorry’ in because I know you’ve no use for it. Can I say I’m sorry for ‘semi-inappropriately’ drawing you? That one isn’t really as big because I can’t truly be apologetic for something that led to this friendship. How about an ‘I’m sorry’ for being patently unfair by dropping my troubles onto you when you had exams? I probably also owe you an apology for digging into fresh wounds when I had no right.  
_  
_You seem to place a lot of your worth into who you are in relation to others. I can’t presume to know you well in any way, especially the you that you talk about when you speak of Kostia. I can say that the you right now, though - the one that gets angry at people sketching them but also tries to apologize with coffee and letters and so willingly helps shoulder an almost-stranger’s pain - that you is beautiful and worth so much more than you give credit for.  
_  
_Your friends, even if they knew you through Kostia first, are still your friends. I learned that lesson when I broke up with my ex - he and his sister were close to a lot of my closest friends, yet those friendships never suffered from our breakup. People change and grow as life happens but true friends will recognize you for you throughout. I think that the ones you’ve made - regardless of how or why - are good ones from what you’ve told me. Anya sounds like a steady influence. Family like Lincoln and Indra, they’re a lot more than what anyone could ever ask for. I guess what I’m trying to say is the Lexa Natron that they know and love is worth it and I wish Lexa Natron would consider that.  
_  
_Raven said something to me that has made a huge difference in these past few days. Maybe it will make a difference for you, too. I’ll share, anyway:  
_  
_It’s okay to be tired. It’s okay to drown in the what-ifs and always-present love and the moments that you know won’t happen anymore. It’s okay to feel the sadness and let yourself sink into it. Just remember that you always have people to help pull you back out, alright? Whether it’s Anya or Lincoln or even me, you’ll always have someone.  
_  
_Your words and understanding have made a world of difference and I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you. You allowed me to talk about my Dad in a way that I haven’t been able to for a long time: to acknowledge the pain and the loss without needing to pretend that I’m okay. Moving that sadness to the surface and letting it out, it’s allowed me to feel the happiness of memories and really smile about him again. I’d like to be able to be that outlet for you, too, if I’m not overstepping? You wrote about wanting to be able to speak of Kostia without only feeling anger and loss. I don’t think it’s as far away or as hopeless as it may feel to you in this moment.  
_  
_Maybe we can start small, with the little things that sometimes you remember on a rainy day that make you smile. Or maybe we can start from where it hurts and slowly move to where it doesn’t. Write what you want, and I will always read it and be here for you. It’s the least I could do, right? We’re friends, after all.  
_  
_I hope you’re settling into Washington well. I really hope it is Washington or else I’ve spent this letter writing to you in the wrong place…  
_  
_Thank you, again. I look forward to this summer of exciting new beginnings.  
_  
_Clarke  
_  
**  
  
**Subject:** Volunteer Position Summer 2015  
**Date:** Tues May 26, 2015 @ 12:04 PM  
**From:** Lorelei Tsing  <l.tsing@partners.org>  
**To:** Clarke Griffin  <clarke.griffin@mit.edu>  
  
Hello Miss Griffin,  
  
As per our earlier correspondence, I am contacting you with information regarding a summer volunteer position under my supervision. It will span the months of June - August with a potential for extension into the school year. Please respond with your availability so we can begin scheduling your hours.  
  
Give Abigail my regards.

**Lorelei Tsing, MD**  
Hematology/Oncology BMT Program  
Clinical Director, Leukemia Program  
100 Blossom Street  
Boston, MA  
Phone: (617) 555 0199

**

[Postcard of The Artist’s Garden at Vatheuil]

_  
May 30, 2015_

  
  
_Dear Clarke,  
_  
_I am writing this to you from the cafeteria at the National Gallery of Art. Have you visited? Judging by how familiar you are with the MFA, I think you would quite comfortably be able to spend a year or two in here. I only arrived in D.C. yesterday and have yet to see much of the city; hopefully by the time your letter gets to my new address I will have more to talk about than ‘moving is hard work’. I hope you have been well, and look forward to hearing from you.  
_  
_Regards,  
_  
_Lexa  
_  
**  
Clarke finds the posting on the pre-med forum she signed up for in first year but rarely visits. Her tea is tepid, chilled by the hours of inattention, and the sips stick in her mouth as she scrolls past rows of GPA discussions. She’s about to close the window when the words _art studio volunteer_ needed and _Blum Patient and Family Resource Center_ slide beneath her cursor.  
  
For a moment, she considers it: a summer spent building beauty from blank canvases, paint strokes easy and calm. Art has always been her moment to breathe and there’s a part of her that lives in its peace. The offer to meld what heals her with the healing of others keeps Clarke hovering on the post but eventually the thought of wasted opportunities makes Clarke close the window.  
  
She doesn’t think of it again until a week later when she arrives at her scheduled first day to find Dr. Tsing out of the country for a last minute conference. The assistant barely spares her a glance, busying himself with organizing folders and raising an eyebrow when he looks up and Clarke is still there.  
  
“Keep by your email at all times,” the assistant says once he realizes Clarke won’t leave. He sounds harried and long suffering, visibly irritated by the sound of a patient raising their voice in discomfort. “We will inform you if there are any scheduling changes.”  
  
“Is there any way I can help out while Dr. Tsing is away?” Clarke tries. She feels a coil of distaste run through her as the assistant frowns - whether it’s at her or at the patient who is now shouting for assistance, Clarke isn’t sure - and she focuses on keeping her expression neutral.  
  
“No. And I need to take care of this. Just keep checking your email, Miss - ” the assistant pauses, checks his computer screen before looking at Clarke again, “- Griffin. I’m sure we’ll see you soon.”  
  
Clarke is left to watch the assistant walk away, approaching the patient and addressing them in curt tones. For a moment she considers following - the patient seems increasingly upset, voice a staccato of frustration - but she stops when the assistant looks up, the warning that she is unwelcome clear on his face.

The nausea of failing to have helped where help was obviously needed clings to her through her subway ride home, and Clarke can’t help but wonder if Lexa, too, is struggling to escape the starting line.  
  
**

**Raven Reyes**  
last seen today at 2:32 PM

 

On a scale of one to ten, how responsible do                   
you consider me as a person?     2:13 PM

like a two                                          2:15 PM

Really?     2:17 PM

  
*fifty two                                           2:18 PM  
it’s also your hotness rating              2:19 PM  
please princess you’re the most  
responsible person i know                2:21 PM  
did something happen                      2:35 PM  
tell me about it when you get home  
we haven’t had dinner in a while  
i’ll make pasta?                                 3:17 PM  
  
**  
  
It takes Lexa less than a week to realize that D.C. is not the city for her - or, more specifically - it is not the city for her hair. Every percentage point of humidity seems to add approximately the same volume to it. Summer has only just begun, but she’s already sent a few too many angsty bathroom mirror photos to Anya for someone in proper employment (unpaid and grossly overworked as it may be).  
  
The days of her internship are long, full of tasks that are mindlessly repetitive and people that are frustratingly mindless. The constant occupation of school work and internship applications has disappeared to leave the time that should feel free sit empty in its wake.  
  
She’d thought that leaving California, wiping the slate clean with D.C. and starting anew, would help her settle into something that would feel less like the end of the life she thought she’d have, more like a future. She’d thought that texting Anya would be enough, but it isn’t the same as her constant, quiet presence. Kostia might not be there between her and every person she tries to make conversation with, but she’s still here in things she wants to share, in times when it’s hard to breathe and she's no longer given the understanding she thought she'd been past needing.  
  
It's difficult to make friends with her fellow interns when politeness is more than she can manage, when just putting the wrong key in her lock makes her frustration bubble up into swearing loudly enough that it sets off the yapping of a dog in the next apartment over.  
  
The front door kicks open into a lone pizza menu and as the hope drains from her she can feel her day collapse. She picks the menu up, opens it half-expecting to see her name in even, curled lines on an envelope stuffed inside of it. Her skin feels stretched too tight and the threads of everything inside of her are thin and fragile, spun too far from what she knows of herself.  
  
Lexa fishes for her phone to dial the number of the pizza place, pauses as she accidentally calls up her contact list. She finds herself scrolling down, and for a long moment, her thumb hovers over her screen.

It isn’t Clarke’s fault that she’s pinned all of today’s hope on a letter that has yet to reach her postbox; she can’t fault her for the way her day – her year, and her life – come crashing down around her. Still she does, with a hurt and anger that is too frustratingly wrongheaded to find a focus.

She isn’t even hungry. She wants Clarke’s letter in her hands, Anya on her couch, Indra and Lincoln in her kitchenette, Kostia. She wants so many things that she doesn’t and can’t have.

Lexa forcefully scrolls back up - past Charlie Xmas Party and Byron MMS Project - to dial the first number there.

It rings for long enough that she almost hangs up. “Hey,” Anya’s voice is breathless and happy in a way that only deepens the distance between them and the loneliness in her stomach.  
  
“Hi.”  
  
“You okay?”  
  
Lexa thinks about that, taking the pizza menu and going through to her bedroom, settling back against the headboard before she answers. “Probably not.”  
  
“Anything I can do?”  
  
“Probably not,” Lexa repeats, faster this time, to stall any further offer, but Anya only laughs as if she’s joking.  
  
“Well, I wanted to talk to you anyway. I’m going to be volunteering on the phones this summer-"  
  
The passion in Anya’s voice feels like a remembered nostalgia from childhood – she knows she once cared about this. The primaries were always her favourite part – like how most people preferred the final twelve of American Idol and she’d always stopped watching after the auditions stage. She knows she should care about this now, but the level that Anya is at is beyond anything Lexa can drag herself towards.  
  
She lets Anya’s words wash over her, hanging up after contributing less than a minimal amount of words to the conversation and feeling almost the same sense of numbness about their phone call as she does about the lack of options on the pizza menu.  
  
**  
  
_“You’ve reached the voicemail of Wells Jaha. I am not available at the moment. If this is an urgent BALSA matter, please contact Nathan Miller. For LSHR matters, please contact Maya Vie. I will respond to your call as soon as I am back in the country on June 15, apologies for the inconvenience.”_  
  
“Hey. It’s me - your favorite best friend leaving her fifteenth voicemail on your phone since you flew off to no-reception-land for that internship to save the human race.  
  
“Had a kind of weird day today that brought up some things I promised we would talk more about when you got back. I know you’ll be back next week but I really missed hearing your voice so I settled for your voicemail even if it’s just full of NYU law jargon.  
  
“Anyway, I miss you. Call me when you land. Bye.”  
  
**  
  
Lexa gets up too late to be able to open the envelope on her floor, but knowing that it’s there waiting for her to get back is enough that some of her patience returns - she shows one of the other interns how to do a mailing list on Excel and gets someone to sit next to in the cafeteria as well as a thank you.  
  
Her phone vibrates as they’re talking about the weather - it’s dull, but it’s something - and she listens to the voicemail on her way home, the casual words no longer properly hiding Anya’s concern.  
  
She puts her phone to the side to pick up Clarke’s letter, and she’s writing her response almost before she’s finished reading it. It’s this that she’s missed - the outlet for all of the building jumble in her head, the way that writing it down gets it out of her brain and into the world without having to vocalize it. The way she felt without a letter from Clarke had been making her uneasy - she thought her reliance on Clarke was bordering on something that could be unhealthy. And maybe it was, a little, using the distance of Clarke and letters instead of speaking to her friends. But - maybe needing someone to talk to was okay, maybe it was normal.  
  
The fact that she’d even had to think that sentence may mean that Clarke was right. Perhaps she needed to give herself a little more credit.  
  
**

_June 9, 2015_

  
  
_Dear Clarke,_  
  
_Washington is not Boston, and it’s not California. That probably sounds facetious, but it’s just very sterile in comparison. Everyone seems to think that they are too busy and too important. I would have bought into the vibe of the city before, I think, but impressing me appears to be harder now.  
_  
_It’s almost like I can feel myself changing but I’m too far away from everything I know to find the measure. I think that's another reason that I've been enjoying our correspondence: you only know me without her, and I suppose I’m trying to find out who that is now.  
_  
_Thank you for letting me speak of her, and for your thoughts on how to continue. Today was almost a good day so I’d rather not bring everything back up again this evening; still, it means a lot to know that I could, if I wished.  
_  
_I have been waiting to receive your letter until I wrote to you again but I, too, have a lot of words. Perhaps I should have begun this weeks ago - just the act of beginning has let me find a way to order my thoughts. I don’t believe I’d written a letter other than a thank you note for years before this but I’m glad we began our friendship, so please don’t apologize for that drawing of me.  
_  
_I hope you have been finding time to draw in your summer and have not been working too hard.  
_  
_My internship is not as I expected - I am very busy, which I enjoy, but it is the sort of busy that feels like I’m not creating any kind of impact. It is mostly note-taking and writing up reports of meetings and hearings, and the occasional presentation. As you said early on in our correspondence - perhaps I have been overly optimistic about how able I am to change things around me. The organization I’m working for (IRC) is large and being a part of something large should feel greater. It should at least feel greater than the problems it’s facing, but although IRC does great work, the issues are so immense and so deep-rooted that I’m no longer sure anyone can truly make a real, lasting difference - much less just me, myself. It feels like almost everyone I work with is just getting by with most of their attention on waiting out the work day, and worse, I feel that I'm doing the same.  
_  
_Reading the news used to fill me with determination - now it breaks my heart. I do not know if how overwhelmed I feel by everything that’s happening in the world is in reaction to what has been happening in my life, or if it is just me, growing up. I suppose the two can’t really be separated._  
_  
How is your summer going, and your volunteer work? I hope you are relaxing after your exams, and that you were pleased by your results._  
_  
Regards,_  
_  
Lexa  
_  
**  
  
Clarke is in the middle of putting the pasta in to boil when her phone rings and she hears the snap of dry fettuccine breaking in her hands. The day has been long, the kind built of a draining anger, and the buzz of her phone is too much.  
  
“Hey. Call for you,” Raven says, stepping behind the counter with only the smallest of grimaces. Her leg has been prone to cramping lately and Clarke feels another pang of annoyance, this time at herself for failing to notice her friend’s discomfort. Her phone buzzes away in Raven’s outstretched hand.  
  
“Thanks. Can you -” Clarke gestures to the pasta. She feels Raven hip check her lightly.  
  
“Go, it’s Wells. Tell the bum I said welcome back.”  
  
“Thanks,” Clarke says again. She turns to go when the hand Raven has on the small of her back nudges her, but pauses. There’s something in the cast of Raven’s eyes - she looks tired, a familiar tightness around her lips - and it makes Clarke press her own hand to Raven’s shoulder. “Remind me to help you massage your leg after dinner, okay?”  
  
“Hm,” Raven says. Then, after a moment, “Looking forward to it, babe.”  
  
“Right back at you,” Clarke says as she steps out of the kitchen, the sounds of Raven putting on music and starting to chop vegetables fading with the click of her bedroom door.  
  
“Hello?”  
  
Shuffling, and then, “Hey.”  
  
Wells' voice is warm - warm and familiar and Clarke hadn’t realized just how much she’d missed the reality of Wells being on other end of the line. She feels the tension of her day melt out of her, replaced by the flood of words she hasn’t been able to share with her best friend in the months he’s been away. Clarke flexes her hand and tries to force herself still.  
  
“You alive, Griffin?” Wells laughs when the silence has gone on for too long. Clarke knows she’s smiling too wide into her phone, that Wells can’t see it anyway, but the joy of hearing from her best friend again fills her heedlessly.  
  
“Just barely. Took you long enough to call.”  
  
“I had to listen to all the voicemails you left me first,” Wells says, laughing. “That, and I actually just got back in.”  
  
“Excuses.” Clarke had meant to at least try to sound serious but her voice is too soft for it to be believable. Wells laughs again, solid and vibrant despite the tinny connection, and the sound pulls the confession out of Clarke that has been keeping her words tied in a heavy knot behind her teeth. “I’ve really missed you.”  
  
“Hey.” Wells pauses. Clarke can almost see the way he would look at her, head dipped down until she’d finally raise her head to meet his eyes. Wells’ voice is deep and solemn as he says, “I missed you too.”  
  
They fall silent after that, quiet as the weight of long months spent on different continents dissolves into a warm relief. Clarke leans back against her headboard and gazes out at the hazy grey of her Boston night, wonders if it’s the same as Wells’ in New York, as the one in Washington that her letter must be arriving into. “I promised myself I wouldn’t keep saying that to you in our first conversation. Figured I would try to talk about real things instead of making myself feel needy.”  
  
“Don’t be an idiot, a man always likes to be needed.”  
  
“Because you are so rarely,” Clarke laughs and she feels her cheeks hurt at the wide smile Wells’ hum of amusement pulls from her.  
  
It’s the dim hours of twilight by the time Wells has exhausted his stories of frantic emails from Miller, the way Maya had perfected her sardonic eyebrow raise through selfies sent from meetings Wells had missed. An empty plate sits on Clarke’s bedside table - Raven had slipped in and dropped off the pasta and a glass of wine midway through the conversation, _for celebrating the return of your bestie_ \- and she swipes the last of the pasta sauce with her finger before laughing at something Wells says. She half-expects him to launch into that annoying impression of his father he always does when he thinks Clarke won’t see it coming but instead he falls silent, contemplative in the wake of their hours of catching up.  
  
“We've spent this whole time talking about what I’ve been up to but you’re the one who left all those cryptic voicemails. Are we going to finally talk about those or are you just going to leave me in suspense?”  
  
It’s tempting to brush Wells off. She could just tell him about the brief visit she had with Rose and the kids earlier in the week, the happiness in Rose’s toothless smile, the feeling of small arms around her knees. Instead, she listens to the steady breathing on the other end of the line and reminds herself that her best friend knows her better than this, that Wells would let it go for now but the conversation would definitely be revisited later. In the end, she settles for, "I don’t really know where to start.” A sigh bubbles up, sour and weary. “I think… One of the things I admire most about my mom is the way she always prioritizes the wellbeing of her patients. It’s not just their health or that their time in the hospital shouldn’t have to be any harder, it’s that she seems to genuinely care about each and every one of them.”  
  
“Okay,” Wells says when it becomes clear Clarke isn’t going to continue. He seems to consider something before he says, “I know we’ve talked about how Abby's prioritization of patient care is something you aspire to and I remember from one of your earlier voicemails that you mentioned having doubts about Dr. Tsing. Did something specific happen in the past few weeks or is your issue with her an overall kind of thing?”  
  
Clarke hums. “Maybe both? I don’t even know.”  
  
“Clarke,” Wells says. There’s a measure of reproach in his voice, at how noncommittally Clarke replied, at how she still seems to be avoiding, but the thought of trying to verbalize her anger in any way more specific makes her throat tighten. Wells seems to sense her hesitation and his voice is soothing as he says, “I know this isn’t easy to talk about and if you want, we can just talk about something else, but if you’re up for it, I’m here for you to talk things through. It sounds like you’re trying to avoid thinking about it, not that you don’t have an idea of what’s wrong.”  
  
The words, despite Wells’ even and careful tone, sting. Still, Clarke can’t deny the truth in them. She hasn’t had someone pull at a problem so directly in a while - she thinks of her mother and Raven, of their tentative concern tethered so tightly to a fear that she would shut them out again - and the feeling of wanting to do better by them, and in general, makes her miss Wells all the more.  
  
“Sometimes I forget why we’re best friends,” Clarke jokes but her voice is strange in its softness and Wells just scoffs, waits for Clarke to continue.  
  
“I think that… in the time I’ve been working for Dr. Tsing I have seen more patients in pain and panicking when she gets near them than I’ve seen ones who aren’t. Bone marrow extractions are one of the most terrifying things and to see her just go ahead without checking in with the patient first... I think it’s more than just Dr. Tsing herself, too - everyone she’s recruited into her team are brilliant but they completely follow her lead in valuing results over the people they use to get them. I won’t really make a difference as just one person but I just… I just want to fix it.”  
  
Wells stays silent for a long time. Clarke adjusts her legs on the bed, props a pillow up to lean on while she waits. Wells has been her best friend since she was young and her respect for him has only grown with age. He’s always been able to give impartial advice. Clarke thinks of the helpless frustration she’s been mired in for these past few weeks, how she’s only been uselessly circling in anger. She’d worried too much about her mother’s working relationship with Dr. Tsing to bring anything up, Raven had seemed too busy and that morning in the kitchen had been too recent. She wishes now that she had stopped trying to make excuses.  
  
“It’s not up to you to fix everything, Clarke,” Wells says eventually, bringing Clarke out of her thoughts. When she doesn’t respond, he adds, “It’s not always on you to make things better.”  
  
“I don’t know about that. They’re just kids. They’re already sick and hurting, they shouldn’t have to have the added burden of a doctor like Dr. Tsing, too.”  
  
“I know, I definitely get where you’re coming from. The thing is, some things are just out of your control. I’m not saying that you should just sit there and let things keep going the way they are, or that you should feel that this is in any way fine. Try to take a step back though, think realistically about what you can do. It may not seem like much but your individual actions could make a world of difference for the one patient you talk to after a treatment, or the one parent who finally gets an answer to their question. Try to focus on the small things for now - on yourself, on what _you_ could do better - and we can work on the bigger things later. Does that sound like a plan?”  
  
Clarke hums.  
  
“I mean it, Clarke.”  
  
“You’re too smart to be wasted on law, Wells.”  
  
“I’m too smart to be wasted on anything,” Wells says, but he’s only briefly flippant before the concern comes back. “You always try to do so much good all at once, but sometimes you have to remember that you are only one person and the only thing you can really control is yourself. So focus on you, focus on doing the best you can and hopefully the good that you bring will inspire others. That’s what I’ve been telling myself this whole time anyway.”  
  
“Yeah,” Clarke says. She huffs a quiet laugh before finally adding, “Thank you,” and the _for being here, for being back and being my best friend_ stays in her mouth but she’s sure Wells hears it anyway.  
  
“Hey, what are friends for?”  
  
Clarke laughs genuinely this time, and she lets the sound of Wells starting in on a rant about how his father doesn’t understand how difficult it is to achieve a good work/life balance lull her into a sleepy calm.  
  
**

**Anya Wamplei**  
iMessage  
Thursday 18 June, 12:32

**  
  
“Ready to say more than two words to me about your life yet, or am I just going to have to keep talking at you about mine?” is Anya’s greeting, and Lexa should feel guilty, but she’s too busy feeling a warm sort of smile creeping across her face at the fact that Anya knew from just a picture of a pair of scissors.  
  
“Washington is not going the way I thought it would be.”  
  
Anya hums in satisfaction. “Neither are my post-grad applications. What’s Washington done to you? Besides apparently render you incapable of using a hair brush?”  
  
It shouldn’t be a surprise, that they still have things in common. It’s probably easier to find them when she actually contributes to a conversation. Lexa lies back on the couch, ignoring the mess of papers and spreading out on top of them instead in a way that Anya likes to make judgmental faces at her for. “It’s a lot of grunt work, which I expected. I think I just want more. I’ve got too many different places to be this year, it’s going too fast for me to feel like I’m really able to learn as much as I’d like or having any kind of impact. Some of the people I’ve been working with are focused and excited, but most seem to be getting by on the minimum. Even when we are productive, it doesn’t feel like it’s actually producing results. I don’t know. If an organization this big can’t make a real, lasting impact, what chance do I have?”  
  
“Ah. So just small-picture problems that I can help with, then?”  
  
Lexa laughs, curling a hand around her coffee and taking a breath of it and the welcome breeze coming in through open curtains. “You don’t need to solve every problem that I tell you. I’m okay.”  
  
Anya doesn’t respond until Lexa repeats it, “I’m okay, Anya.”  
  
“If repetition is the only rhetorical tool you use, you’ll do very poorly in debates. It’s not making me any more likely to believe you.”  
  
“I do feel quite Sisyphean at the moment.”  
  
“Well, when your rock is heavy enough that you actually want a hand with it.” Anya’s voice is exasperated and fond with a warmth she doesn’t usually show, and at that alone Lexa knows she’s scared her more by hiding than she ever had when she’d been honest.  
  
“It’s been harder than I thought not having you around.”  
  
“Alright, alright, no need for a Mills & Boon declaration.” Lexa can hear how wide Anya’s grin is, so she shrugs in answer.  
  
“I thought you might need to hear it, you don’t sound yourself. What’s this about your post-grad applications?”  
  
It’s only really as Anya launches into the saga - none of which Lexa has heard any of, and it sounds like it’s been going on for months - that Lexa understands why their conversations have been so stilted by phone. Neither one of them had been saying what they’d wanted to. It’s a more relaxed conversation than they’ve had in a long time, and when Lexa hangs up, almost two full hours of her Saturday have gone by.  
  
So yes, maybe Lexa needs people to talk to. Maybe she should stop relying on Clarke and a response that’s taken - what, two weeks at this point, and start speaking to people who know her better, even if they are conversations that are harder to begin.  
  
Or maybe, Lexa thinks, as she checks her mail and finds nothing but disappointment once more, she should stop waiting for other people to speak to her first.  
  
**  
  
**Subject:** Research Assistant Position  
**Date:** Fri June 19, 2015 @ 11:48 PM  
**From:** Lorelei Tsing  <l.tsing@partners.org>  
**To:** Clarke Griffin  <clarke.griffin@mit.edu>  
  
Clarke,  
  
Several of the patients’ parents have informed me that you have been doing exemplary work in regards to their child’s care and have requested that I speak with you regarding an extension on your position. I was not made aware of your efforts prior to this and as such, scheduling your extension will be difficult. Please email my assistant with your timetable and availabilities as soon as possible.  
  
Regards.  
  
**Lorelei Tsing, MD**  
Hematology/Oncology BMT Program  
Clinical Director, Leukemia Program  
100 Blossom Street  
Boston, MA  
Phone: (617) 555 0199  
  
**  
  
The letter that Clarke had started weeks ago sits beneath a pile of papers on xenografts and bone marrow transplants and Clarke fishes it out, reads the hurried _Dear Lexa_ at the top before stuffing it away again to grab her cell phone and rush out the door.  
  
_I’m so sorry this is so late, I’ve been swamped lately_ is added later before she rereads Lexa’s _I’m no longer sure anyone can truly make a real, lasting difference - much less just me, myself_. She wonders what kind of situation Lexa is in, if she’s also trapped amongst people who seem ineffectual and unjust. She scratches out what she has, determined to start again with words that are more worth Lexa’s time.  
  
Later, Clarke starts with _Dear Lexa_ and finds that the stresses of her day have robbed her of anything worth saying.  
  
**  
  
This time, looking through the suitcase - Kos’ favourite shade of slap-to-the-eyes orange - takes only an hour of gathering her courage before dinner. Lexa isn’t sure what she’s looking for, and the loud couple next door fight, make up, and go to sleep before she happens upon the polaroid.  
  
The lid of the suitcase tips closed as she reaches across to her bedside table, slipping the matching photo out from between the pages of the book she’s trying to read and frowning for a moment at the top right corner, fiddling with the edge of it. She fishes in her pocket and comes out with a five dollar bill, putting that in between the pages instead. Side by side, the photos are identical, save for her own thumbprint on one of them - she’d been impatient, Kos had just laughed as the photo had developed with a thumbprint like a halo over her head, said there was a reason she took more than one.  
  
It’s a good photo of them - they’d gone to dinner to celebrate… something, Lexa can’t remember what, exactly. End of exams, or an archery win, or one of Kos’ zine articles getting retweeted by the Human Rights Campaign. Lexa holds a photo in each palm, fingers curving up around the edges, examining them both closely. After her eyes have grown heavy from studying them, the clock on her sidetable a glaring reminder of how soon she has to wake up tomorrow, she lifts her thumb from the imprint she had left so long ago, a ghostly reminder of a laughing grab that had ended in kisses, both photos and camera sliding to the floor.  
  
**

_July 1, 2015_

_Dear Clarke,_  
  
_I mostly ignored your suggestion to speak of her in my last letter. I still don’t think I can at the moment, but I can share this, instead, if that is okay?_  
  
_Lexa_

_ _

_[polaroid of Kostia and Lexa]_

**  
  
The envelope is sitting on the countertop underneath a bright pink Post-It and Clarke traces it with a curious finger, remembers the letter she had meant to write but never did still sitting on her desk. Guilt eats at her as she reads Raven’s hurried scrawl:  
  
_C,_  
  
_Gone out for dinner with the boys. Extra burritos in the fridge. Kept it mild just for you._  
  
_R_  
  
_PS: Looks like this Natron girl is at it again._  
  
The postscript makes Clarke’s cheeks heat as she peels the note away. Her stomach has been growling for hours now - a hospital shift ran much longer than expected - and she hurries to change into more comfortable clothing, setting the microwave to be done when she comes back.  
  
She’s biting into one of the burritos when she finally picks up Lexa’s letter. The envelope is thinner than usual and Clarke can feel something harder than paper hiding in it. She doesn’t quite know what to think when she peels open the flap and a polaroid slides out.  
  
It’s a picture of Lexa. Small and dimly lit, Clarke can only really make out the way Lexa smiles from the bright flash of her teeth but she can imagine the softness of her eyes from the memory of their goodbyes at the MFA. Clarke runs a finger along Lexa’s hair, follows it until it disappears into the body of another girl whose eyes are shut in laughter, affection written in the way she tilts her body into Lexa’s.  
  
It takes a moment - the girl is beautiful, breathtakingly so, and Clarke gets momentarily distracted by the strength of this girl’s features and the easy hand she has resting on Lexa’s hip - before she puts it together:  
  
“Kostia.”  
  
The name hangs. It feels as though it shouldn’t be said, as though it should always be protected on the pages of Lexa’s curled writing. Clarke bites into her burrito as if she could bite her exclamation away. Kostia is radiant - warm, alive - and Clarke swallows back a brief flicker of jealousy at the _K + L - April 2014_ written at the bottom of the polaroid in handwriting that she doesn’t recognize.  
  
(She won’t deal with that, can’t deal with that now. This isn’t about her.)  
  
It’s hours later by the time Clarke makes the decision to open her bedside drawer and take out the watch box. The leather on the case is worn, softened by years of fingertips tracing over it, and Clarke gives it a familiar brush before slowly flipping the lid open.  
  
She hasn’t been able to wear the watch lately - her hospital shifts mean no jewelry and she’d been loathe to leave it in her locker there - but the sight of it still aches just a little. Clarke gives the watch face a gentle tap, a soft _hello-I-missed-you_ , before she turns her attention to the upper lid. It takes a bit of digging but eventually, Clarke manages to pry the photos out from where they had been solidly tucked away and they fall onto her lap, a cascade of happy smiling faces from her childhood.  
  
The clock reads eleven by the time Clarke finally picks one. It’s out of focus, a camera adventure gone wrong in the hands of a four year old. Clarke finds herself smiling at the blur in the corner that is her and the sharper image of her father behind her shoulder, laughing. She flips it over and writes:

_July 6, 2015_

  
  
_Dear Lexa,_  
  
_Of course this is okay. This is better than okay. I’m so sorry for the lack of response, work has been taxing and I wish I had more space to tell you about it. I swear I will send a real letter soon. For now, please enjoy this selection from my childhood photography portfolio._  
  
_Clarke_  
  
_PS: It means a lot that you sent me that photo, Lexa. Thank you._  
  
She drops the envelope off in the mailbox the next morning on her way to the hospital, throws out the letter she never finished, and props the photo of Lexa and Kostia up against her father’s watch box on her bedside table.  
  
**

**Lincoln Ogeda**  
iMessage  
July 7, 21:10

 

Are you still up?

  
Yeah, you ok?

I’m fine.  
After college, when you graduated.  
You went into an internship too, right?

  
Yeah, I did. Research assistant. Wasn’t paid,  
but I got a laptop out of it!

… Didn’t you have to give that back?

  
No.  
Maybe.

Sorry about that.  
Are internships supposed to make you  
hate everyone and everything?

  
Oh, yeah, that wasn’t in the orientation handout?  
They must have forgotten to mention.  
Those political slimeballs.  
Everything going okay out there?

I’m just struggling to remember  
why I wanted to do this.  
It’s fine, but it’s a lot of work.  
Very, very boring work.  
Did I mention it’s work.  
And boring.

  
Haha that’s life, Lex. You want a job,  
you gotta do really boring shit you  
hate to start out with.

When I have any influence in this  
city that’s the first thing I’m changing.

You know who my vote’s with  
(It’s you)  
(You can thank me now)

Thank you, Lincoln.  
For the very sage life advice.  
‘Do boring shit you hate.’

:(  
Seriously, though.  
There's nothing at all you're enjoying about it?

I just wanted this one thing to go the way  
I expected. And it hasn’t.  
It’s fine.  
It’s just not giving me what I wanted.  
And now I don’t know if it’s even really what I should be doing.

You want a lot, Lex. You expect a lot  
and you want a lot and that’s why we  
love you, and why you get so much out of people.  
But you can’t tell me you’ve been in a happy  
place recently - none of us are really thinking  
right. This isn’t a time to be making rash life  
decisions. Stick it out for now

I miss you.

I’ve never been to D.C.

You should definitely come for a weekend.  
You would definitely hate everything about it.

Won’t know til I see it!

**  
  
**Subject:** Applications  
**Date:** Sat July 18, 2014 at 1:52 AM  
**From:** Anya Wamplei  <anya.wamplei@berkeley.edu>  
**To:** Lexa Natron  <l.natron@berkeley.edu>  
  
Find attached. If you could provide constructive criticism that would be much appreciated.

**Anya Wamplei**  
Vice President, University of California, Berkeley ASUC  
Range Commander, Cal Archery Team 2014  
Department of Political Science  
Class of 2015  
  
Attachment 1: Application.1.pages  
Attachment 2: Application.2.pages  
Attachment 3: Application.3.pages  
Attachment 4: Application.fudgrbfjfbfbkshr.pages  
Attachment 5: Application.fuckthis.pages  
Attachment 6: Application.fuckeverything.pages

  
**  
  
Stilted sentence after stilted sentence of Anya’s draft applications are swimming in front of Lexa’s eyes when the doorbell makes her blink and frown away from her laptop. She tries to go back to working at making it sound less like Anya’s given up on life, much less the idea of a postgrad course, but the bell is insistent. She opens the door with a few choice words for whatever they’re trying to sell her on the tip of her tongue.  
  
A very odd, strangled sort of yelp comes out of her throat completely unbidden, and Lincoln’s laughter is smothered in a hug.  
  
“I didn’t mean you had to come visit immediately!”  
  
Lincoln shrugs, hands falling from her shoulders. “I got excited. I was looking up things to do in D.C. and there’s an insect zoo in one of the Smithsonian museums. You can crawl through an exact replica of an African Termite mound!”  
  
He should definitely be embarrassed by that sentence, but his grin is wide and shameless, and Lexa just shakes her head, looking behind her. “Let me grab my keys and we can go find some coffee.”  
  
“Probably putting something other than PJs on would be good too. And - wow, Lex.” Lincoln’s walked past her and into her apartment before she can think about why she should stop him, and his eyes are wide as he scans her kitchen.

“If I’d known you were coming…” Her hands find the edge of a pizza box, and she picks it up off her counter and puts it in the bin, as if that one small motion can actually make a dent in the mess.  
  
Lincoln’s face is all concern when he looks back at her, and Lexa can feel her face heat. “I didn’t realize it had become… quite so bad.”  
  
“Mom would kill you.”  
  
Lexa winces, then winces again as he takes out his phone and takes a picture. “Lincoln!”  
  
“Blackmail material,” he says, before turning unsteadily on one heel, his mouth twisted. “Where’re your cleaning supplies?”  
  
“Coffee first?” Lexa tries, hand already reaching under the kitchen counter for a cloth.  
  
Lincoln’s cleaning playlist, mediocre dancing, and off-key but enthusiastic singing help the afternoon pass, and Lexa’s arms are aching by the time her apartment looks like less of an embarrassment.  
  
Settling onto the couch with a beer in hand later, Lexa almost remembers why she liked this apartment - it’s larger than she remembers, and prettier when the floors and surfaces can actually be seen. Lincoln rolls out his shoulders, thanking her as she twists the top from his bottle.

“You deserve more than one beer for this, Lincoln, thank you. You really shouldn’t have had to do this, I’m sure it’s not what you wanted out of flying out here.”  
  
“Sure it is,” Lincoln says easily, taking a long drink from his bottle and sinking back into the couch with a sigh of relief. “Helping you out is exactly what I came up here for. Plus, it’s kind of nice to help someone else out for a change. All of my friendships have felt a bit one-sided lately.”  
  
Lexa swallows, curling the top-hand corner of the label on her beer. “I know the feeling. I’ve only just realized how hard Anya has been finding her post-grad applications. I was helping her edit when you came in.”  
  
“How hard are you finding things at the moment?” Lincoln’s eyes are dark and too serious when Lexa darts a glance at him. She finds herself staring back wordlessly, throat tight. Lincoln makes a motion that seems to be half about her apartment and half about her face. “This isn’t like you. You’re worrying me.”  
  
Lexa looks at him without saying anything for longer than is polite, long enough to realize that it’s not going to be easy to get out of this conversation, long enough to try and claw words out from somewhere honest, somewhere she’s been trying to avoid thinking about.  
  
“It’s been a hard adjustment. When I think about doing this all over again… I think I’d rather have some stability. And I’m busy, but I’m bored.” She can feel her eyes welling, and she blinks past it, clenching her jaw until the burn of tears has subsided. “There’s just a lot of time to think when I’d rather not. And I’m…” _lonely_ , she thinks, with sudden clarity. _Lonely, and depressed, and maybe not coping._ “I miss you, and my friends.”  
  
“You haven’t exactly been answering calls, Lex. And shit, I get it. Some days I can’t cope with talking to people, but I’ve got Mom and a lot of friends around me to look after me. If you’re going to be far away from people who love you, you need to look after yourself better. You can’t live like this.”  
  
“I know. I’ve… I just reconnected with Anya properly, I think, which is a start. I’ll talk more.”  
  
“I’ve been focusing on work. If your internship isn’t helping, find something to focus on that will. You know, in all the crap we cleared up I didn’t see one newspaper? Have you finally gone digital?”  
  
“I can’t face it, the news. It’s too… I’m trying to focus on feeling okay, and reading the news just makes me feel so hopeless. It just feels like everything’s gone to shit.”  
  
“Ignoring the bad isn’t helpful, Lex. Trust me. There are so many different ways of - Mom and I have been able to talk to Pastor Jeff and it’s - and I’m not saying that what’s been helpful for us is exactly what you need to do, or even that you need to go back to exactly what used to drive you as if nothing’s changed. But you need to find the thing that helps you, and ignoring the bad to try and just focus on the good clearly isn’t getting you anywhere. You’re not going to change anything if you go through life like that. Are you even doing anything outside of the internship?”  
  
Lexa starts to respond but, well, what has she been doing? She’s felt busy, but can’t think of what she’s been doing at nights beyond eating and sleeping.  
  
“You deserved a break for sure, you were always ridiculously busy. I used to get calls from…” Lincoln stops, suddenly, on a surprised intake of breath as though her name has hit the back of his teeth hard enough to hurt him. “She used to worry about you, you’d be so busy. You being this at a loss, with no one here for you and not even trying to find people or things to do, it’s not you. Maybe break time should be over now, so, you know, consider this your friendly kick up the backside. Get your shit together. Not all the way together, but maybe like… clump it on one side of the room at least.” Lexa makes a face at him, but he just smiles at her like he knows her silence means his words are stuck in her brain, and claps his hands. “Where’s this dinner you promised me, I’m starving.”  
  
Fairly certain she hadn’t promised him anything of the sort, but happy not to argue the point, Lexa grabs her wallet. If she’s quiet over dinner, Lincoln seems happy to join her. As always, he’s more focused on the food in front of him than on conversation, even if the food is, as he says in surprise when it’s put in front of him, ‘vegetably’. By the time they leave for the evening, Lexa realizes two things: one, there’s absolutely no reason for them to be eating vegan anymore (they really should have gone for a burger instead); two, Lincoln was probably right. She should probably make a start on getting her shit together, even if it is just making a start. Even if it is just getting a broom out. She can do that much, at least.

  
**

_July 28, 2015_

  
_Dear Lexa,_  
  
_It’s been so long since I last wrote to you and life has gotten so crazy. The frustration of these past few weeks has made me feel so out of sorts. I’ve been crawling out of my own skin with it, but it seems you may be faring even worse in Washington._  
  
_A part of me wants to say that maybe we had too-grand plans for our summers, but another refuses to believe that. I don’t think that you’ve chosen to do something that is truly impossible, nor is it not worth the effort. The change in perspective, though, is sobering. I definitely understand the feeling of being boxed in by the smallest, most menial things when the issue at hand demands so much more._  
  
_My summer has been strange and definitely not relaxing. I’ve been volunteering for a pediatric clinical trial and I spent a day last week trying to convince a little boy that no, we weren’t trying to kill his sister, and yes, we are the good guys. I remember we had both written about our excitement for this upcoming summer, for all the new things we were going to experience and the change we could help bring about. I’ve spent these past weeks stuck in frustration on behalf of the patients that I feel are being mistreated. It seems almost as if I’ve taken so many more steps back than I had forward. It took a conversation with my best friend to help me see that what little I thought I was doing could still make a difference, it just depends on who I think I’m helping._  
  
_Perhaps change happens in the small things, in the moments where each person makes a choice and chooses to make that first step of difference. I know that while I can’t right the wrongs I think are embedded in the program I work in, the effort that I put in can help the patients that I see. I helped a little boy smile and that in turn eased his sister’s mind so she wouldn’t have to bear the pain of her illness and her brother’s tears at the same time. I’d call that a win, all things considered._  
  
_I’m not sure of the details of your work at the IRC but maybe a similar approach can be taken? I remember my summer with the MSF was full of paperwork and it felt like I never really reached anybody. It sounds like you’re going through a similar situation. We were always reminded that everyone has a role to play and no matter how small, everything we did helped because we helped keep the MSF branch running, we helped keep things organized so the brunt of the efforts could be focused outward toward people in need. Large organizations are inherently flawed in that respect, but I suppose not everyone can be on the front lines all the time. Maybe there’s something else in Washington that you could do that would put you more on the front lines so you can regain that sense of accomplishment too?_  
  
_I’m glad you found a way to talk about Kostia, even if it wasn’t really talking. If you don’t think of what it’s done for you at least know that you helped me also face my own pain. I haven’t looked at those photographs of my father in a long time but I’m glad I did. And he did love me very much, just as I loved him. I’m happy that I could share that with you._  
  
_Thanks again for writing, Lexa. I’m sure that the new places that you’ll be in, the new place that you’re in right now, it’ll make you feel like you’re changing. Just know that I think you’re only changing for the better, and you’ll find the measure of it in the good you do no matter where you are. I’m sure Anya will back me up on this._  
  
_I look forward to hearing from you soon,_  
  
_Clarke_  
  
**  
  
“Yo Griffin, you ready?”  
  
Clarke looks up to see Raven leaning against her doorframe, red dress tight and hair curled just so. She looks down for a second at the simple floral print dress she’s chosen to wear and wonders if she’s missed a memo. “I thought we were just going for tacos.”  
  
“We are.”  
  
“Do you have a date that you’re going to ditch me for? That dress is deadly.”  
  
“Girl’s gotta look good even for mediocre company,” Raven says. Her face splits into a shit-eating grin. “And in no uncertain terms is that company you. Come on, I’m starving. When are you going to be done?”  
  
“Well, I need to change now. Maybe back into PJs since you called me mediocre.”  
  
“Princess, please.” Clarke resists the urge to slap her hand away when Raven makes a move toward her, grabbing for the brush in her hand.  
  
“Don’t you dare, Raven.”  
  
“You look great, that dress matches your sunny disposition, your hair is starting to frizz from over-brushing. Can we please go before I die?”  
  
“You call that apologizing?”  
  
“Clarke,” Raven groans, and Clarke watches as Raven shuffles over to her bed, flops onto it without a care for her dress or her hair. It’s been a while since Raven has been in her room and she’s not surprised when Raven turns her head to the side, pauses at the photograph that’s been propped up on her bedside table.  
  
“Is that Natron?”  
  
“Hm,” Clarke hums. She can feel the beginnings of a smile tugging at her lips despite how noncommittal she’s managed to sound. Clarke fights to keep it from spreading, from giving away the warmth in her chest that builds every time she sees that polaroid.  
  
The warmth stutters a little bit when Raven asks, “Who’s that beside her? Girlfriend?”  
  
Raven’s examining the _K + L_ at the bottom now, finger tracing over it in much the same way as Clarke’s had. She holds it up for Clarke to see and her face is a study in skepticism. “Don’t tell me you’re pining after a taken woman, Griffin. You’re better than that.”  
  
“She actually - It’s not -” Clarke starts, stops, searches for something that doesn’t sound dismissive or defensive. All that’s in her head is the white of Lexa’s knuckles as she had asked Clarke to change the subject at the MFA. All she thinks of is _I was a better person before I lost her_ and _I just want her back_. The words crawl stickily up her throat. “Her girlfriend passed away several months ago.”  
  
“Oh. Oh shit. I’m sorry.”  
  
“You didn’t know.” The flicker of gratitude that licks up Clarke’s chest at the guilt on Raven’s face gets forcefully pushed down. “She’s been in a rough place for a while now and I think we’re kind of learning where the sad parts are, that we can talk to each other and it might help.”  
  
“And does it?” Raven asks, “Help?”  
  
“I think so,” Clarke says after a long moment. She remembers the numbness of crying on the subway, the feeling of it draining onto paper and the solidity of Lexa’s words. “I don’t know how so many things seem to have happened in such a short time but I’m grateful that Lexa has been willing to listen, that she seems to trust me, too. Maybe I just needed someone who was outside of everything to make me realize that the status quo isn’t the be all end all, that change isn’t as terrifying as it seems.”  
  
Raven is quiet after that. Quiet in a way that makes Clarke look up from her hands, look to see where Raven’s at. Her face is caught somewhere between pensive and something bordering on sour and Clarke doesn’t quite understand why, not when Raven had been teasing her just moments before, not when Raven was the one who told her to try and talk to people.  
  
“Hey. You okay?”  
  
“Hm.”  
  
Raven’s stiff. The polaroid gets put back onto Clarke’s bedside table, a finger pressing down on it almost too forcefully and Clarke opens her mouth to ask why, except -  
  
“Have I done something wrong, Clarke?”  
  
“What?”  
  
“You said you needed someone outside of it all. Makes me think the people inside of it weren’t good enough.”  
  
“That is not what I meant - ” Clarke starts. Raven fixes her with a dark look and Clarke can feel the beginnings of anger bloom in the shaking of her fingertips. “Is that really all you got out of what I said?”  
  
Raven sits up. “What was it that I was supposed to get from what you said, then?”  
  
“I - I don’t - ” Clarke splutters, “Where is this even coming from, Raven?”  
  
The air between them is brittle. Raven sits quietly, hands clenched white-knuckled in her lap. Her dress has ridden up but she makes no move to fix it and Clarke watches as Raven takes a breath, then two, works to let her fingers uncurl.  
  
“I’m happy that you found someone to talk to,” Raven starts. A mocking _but_ crawls up Clarke’s throat but she closes her teeth against it, holds it in her mouth as Raven finds the words to continue. “I’m happy that Wells is back, that Lexa seems to really understand you and you’re talking to Abby. I’m happy that you’re doing better at work, that you’re feeling better. I’m happy that you feel like you can change and it’s fine and that you’re moving on to bigger and better things.”  
  
“Raven - “  
  
“I’m happy that you have all of these people who care about you and that your life is getting back on track and I guess I should be happy that you’re happy but honestly - ” Raven clears her throat but the words still come out in a rasp, “Honestly, I feel like I’m lying because how can anyone be happy about being left behind?”  
  
The anger pushing against the back of Clarke’s teeth dies instantly. The only thing that tumbles from her mouth when it opens slightly in shock is a shaky breath and Raven meets Clarke’s eyes then, defiant even when the curl of her shoulders suggests something else.  
  
“Don’t pretend like you’re surprised about this.”  
  
“Raven,” Clarke tries, but Raven’s jaw tightens at her tone. Clarke fights the defensiveness that rises up but she can’t seem to find the middle ground between that and the pity she knows Raven hates. She tries again anyway. “I know I haven’t been around as often lately but that doesn’t mean I’m leaving you behind.”  
  
“You don’t need to be _around_ all the time, Clarke, I’m not into that co-dependent shit.”  
  
“That’s not what I meant - ”  
  
“Being around isn’t what’s important. Lord knows how much I hated you when you were around that first year.”  
  
“Come on - ”  
  
“Just _stop_ , Clarke.”  
  
Anything Clarke had meant to say - and she thinks suddenly that maybe nothing she has is worth saying, not when Raven is looking at her with such angry disappointment - is lost behind the click of her teeth. Raven’s stare bores into her and it’s such a stark contrast to the dark warmth of her usual gaze that Clarke feels it burrow, sharp and hot, into the hollow of her chest.  
  
“I don’t understand why this is happening.”  
  
“That’s just it, Clarke. You don’t. You think I’m being unfair - no, don’t try to deny it, I can see it on your face - you think I’m being unfair and you know what, I probably am. You’re out there saving the world one child at a time and I’m blaming you for not being around enough. And you know what, usually I’d be okay with that. Usually I own up to my shit. But this isn’t about you being absentee or liking Wells more than me or some stupid shit like that. This is about the fifth of fucking July and you not remembering.”  
  
It takes a moment - of Clarke staring at Raven, of Raven breathing heavily, winded by her own anger - but Raven’s words change from accusations to a deep, unforgiving weight and Clarke knows then exactly why Raven is so tired, why she didn’t brush off Clarke’s offer to massage her leg, why she looks so betrayed now.  
  
“I don’t ask for much, Clarke. I don’t - You have this amazing, beautiful, life-saving mother who you’ve shared with me for the last few years and I am so grateful for that. But my worthless drunk of a mother who calls me only once a year on her fucking birthday to remind me I was put on this planet to give her money called again and -” Raven takes a deep breath. “I really fucking needed you, Clarke, and you weren’t there. And you don’t even fucking remember.”  
  
If Clarke had given herself a chance to think about it the guilt and defensiveness would have immobilized her. As it is, she pushes herself out of her chair and crosses the room in two steps, takes one look at Raven’s trembling frame and throws caution to the wind.  
  
“I am so, so sorry, Raven. I am so sorry.”  
  
Raven doesn’t move from within Clarke’s arms. Her back is stiff, shoulders pulled up against Clarke’s touch, but Clarke works with the rigidity, holds Raven and curls a palm around the back of Raven’s head. The other rubs comforting circles across the span of Raven’s back.  
  
They don’t say anything for a long time. Raven’s breathing remains even, a quiet whisper that does nothing to soften her; Clarke follows it with her fingers up and down Raven’s spine. She remembers when it had been Raven’s fingers tracing along her back, the darkness of a brittle morning doing nothing to hide her pain. The fact that Raven had been there - has always unequivocally been there - makes Clarke’s absence all the more painful. She takes the guilt, the anger she feels at herself and presses it deep into her chest, grates it in until she feels raw.  
  
“Do you remember what you asked me, that first year?” Clarke finally says. Raven still hasn’t moved except for a slight tilt of her head and Clarke can feel her breath on her shoulder, small puffs of air that come a little bit unsteadily now.  
  
“What first year?” Raven says.  
  
“The one when you finally trusted me with this.” Raven scoffs, a motion Clarke feels more than hears, but she squeezes Raven tighter, hopes to convey _hear me out I’m sorry please hear me out_.  
  
“You asked me how you ended up here, how you went from being picked first - for awards, for scholarships, for everything - to crying on the bathroom floor with your ‘stuck up blonde princess roommate from hell’. Do you remember that?”  
  
“I was never that pathetic,” Raven says. Clarke feels the beginnings of a smile against her shoulder but it dissipates when Raven says, “What I do remember is someone telling me that she’d pick me first like it was a promise she could keep. Do _you_ remember that?”  
  
Clarke closes her eyes. The rise and fall of Raven’s chest is even against her own but there’s a telltale shiver in her frame that Clarke can’t bear to let grow, to see become the tears Raven has always hated. She takes a deep breath and pulls back, rests her hands on Raven’s shoulders and dips her head until Raven finally meets her gaze.  
  
“Of course I remember. I meant it when I said it: I’d pick you first. I know I haven’t been the best at showing that lately - honestly, I’ve just been a shitty friend - but I am here now and I’m going to do better. I am picking you first, right now.”  
  
Raven doesn’t say anything at that. Her eyes are dark, wet despite her best intentions. Clarke waits with an uneasy feeling in her chest but Raven doesn’t seem to have a response for Clarke’s declaration and Clarke doesn’t quite know how to proceed. She tries, anyway.  
  
“I’m not just saying this because you brought up your mother. I hadn’t realized how much I haven’t been around lately, how much I haven’t been here for you. There are a lot of things happening right now that I’m still learning how to deal with and I am really sorry that you feel like you’ve fallen to the wayside. That… that you _have_ fallen to the wayside. You mean a lot to me and it was never my intention to ever make you feel otherwise.”  
  
The words feel raw in the air between them, like Clarke had thrown them out there when neither of them had really been prepared for it. For a moment, Clarke wonders what Raven would even want from her if not an apology, but she thinks better of it and focuses on what she can do. She can’t change what Raven is thinking, she can only change what she does, what she chooses to say.  
  
“I can’t promise that I’m going to be any better in the immediate future. I _am_ going to try my best to be more present. Things have changed a lot and I am learning to change with them, but please, please know that how much I love you hasn’t changed. You are the sister I never had, Raven Reyes. I’m grateful to have Wells back on the same continent, to be able to talk to my mother about things again, to have Lexa, even, as a new friend, but you are family. You matter as you always have and even though I’m doing a really shitty job of showing it, it’s true. I am really sorry I haven’t been there for you, Raven. I am going to try to do better, I promise.”  
  
Raven is unnaturally still, sweeps dark, hard eyes over Clarke that leaves Clarke wondering what she’s looking for. Eventually, Raven stops and her eyes settle, tired but dry. “You still haven’t answered my question of whether you’re pining after Natron.”  
  
“That’s - that’s what you’re going to say?”  
  
Raven shrugs, the shadow of a grin on her lips. It fades quickly. “I don’t know what else to say. I appreciate your apology, and I know that you’re going through some shit. I guess I was starting to feel like you didn’t give a shit about me anymore which I could deal with if I didn’t care so much about you.” Raven shrugs again. “Thank you for apologizing. It means a lot that you still care about me, I guess. God, I hate being sappy.”  
  
Clarke laughs at that, a surprisingly wet thing that Raven echoes. “I will always care about you, Raven. Now I know that I need to be more aware of how I show it, that I make sure show it, that’s all. I’m really sorry that you thought I didn’t. And I’m really sorry I wasn’t there for you when your mother called.”  
  
Raven shrugs. “It’s whatever.”  
  
“No, it’s not. I know how much she gets to you.”  
  
“It’s been so many years. She really shouldn’t get to me anymore but - somehow she still does.”  
  
“She’s your mother,” Clarke says simply. Raven sighs.  
  
“Look, I cried my eyes out over this already, I’m kind of over it. I just felt shafted by how much you care about Lexa’s input in your life and how it seemed like you didn’t need anyone else who was still in front of you but that apparently isn’t true, so -”  
  
“It’s really not,” Clarke interjects.  
  
“So we’re good. You can be my shoulder to cry and vent on if I still feel shitty about my mother later, but for now I really want to get those tacos. You in?”  
  
“Yeah,” Clarke says with a smile. She wipes at her eyes - when had they gotten so blurry? - and stands, straightening her dress with shaky hands. Raven follows suit. The thought suddenly occurs to her. “We should have dinner with my mom soon.”  
  
“I’m down,” Raven says easily, but there’s a weighted look on her face that lets Clarke know how much the offer means to her. “You know I’d never turn down a dinner date with someone as hot as Abby.”  
  
“Ugh, God. Why do you have to be like this.”  
  
“You love me,” Raven grins. Clarke smiles but pauses, puts a hand on Raven’s shoulder and nudges for her to turn around so she's facing Clarke before they reach the front door. Clarke's voice is soft when she says:  
  
“I do.”  
  
“Thanks... Sappy McGriffin,” Raven laughs, but there's a catch in her voice that gives her emotions away. They’re putting on their shoes and Clarke is struggling to get into her heels when Raven adds, “Natron is hot, I’ll give you that.”  
  
Clarke nearly topples over. “Raven, stop it!”  
  
Their laughter echoes down the hallway as Raven locks up and Clarke thinks that no matter what, she won’t let this change, she’ll make sure this grows with whatever her life is changing into.  
  
**

_July 22, 2015  
_

  
_Dear Clarke,  
_  
_I know a little something about being too busy to write a full response - instead of a proper reply, which will take longer, here is the take-out menu I have been ordering from exclusively from for the past month. I’ve tried everything on their menu at this point. Kos used to hate that I ate so badly. So here, have the menu, help save me from myself. I’ll try and actually cook tonight instead (I won’t lie, I have saved their number to my contacts list just in case).  
_  
_Lexa  
_  
_(P.S. - your father looks exactly as I thought he would from your descriptions. It’s clear he loved you very, very much.)  
_  
**

**Lexa Natron**  
Text Message  
2015-07-28 3:17 AM

  
Lexa Natron delete those takeout  
numbers from your phone right now.

2015-07-28 8:21 PM

No.  
  


2015-07-28 8:48 PM

Yikes.  
Okay, I see your point.  
Maybe don’t delete them just yet.

I would take offense but I can’t feel my tongue.

**  
  
Clarke’s letter sits heavy in Lexa’s pocket, her head full of lines of advice she isn’t sure she knows how to take. She grabs a vending machine lunch and retreats with her laptop to a spare corner of the office, searching through local news for something she’s not sure she’ll find.  
  
Lexa had bought a newspaper over the weekend, read it until her heart ached with everything she didn’t know how to help fix. She’d texted Anya asking for documentary recommendations from the past few months and received a list back that was going to take her at least a week to get through.  
  
She’s clicking through links about homeless youth in D.C. when her phone buzzes, Anya’s name on the screen. She slides a thumb across the ‘ignore’ button, not wanting to lose track of the fifteen tabs she has open, studies and articles about local issues. They may have still been systemic, their causes still nauseatingly awful and not able to be solved overnight, but hopefully there’s something in here that will help her feel a level of impact that she just isn’t able to when faced with multiple refugee crises.  
  
**  
  
**Subject:** Involvement in Local Programs  
**Date:** Mon August 10, 2015 @ 12:57pm  
**From:** Lexa Natron  <l.natron@irc.com>  
**To:** Casa Ruby <info@casaruby.com>  
  
Good afternoon,  
  
On looking into the homeless in D.C. I heard about your program: it is exciting in its scope and the work that you do is so important to me. It is my hope that you would have an opening for volunteers in an administrative or fundraising capacity. If there are any positions open, I have attached your volunteer form, along with a cover letter and my resume.  
  
Please do let me know how I can get involved.  
  
Kind Regards,  
  
Lexa Natron  
  
Attachment 1: CasaRubyCoverLetter.pdf  
Attachment 2: ResumeLexaNatron.pdf  
Attachment 3: VolunteerFormLexaNatron.pdf

**

_August 11, 2015_

_Dear Clarke,_  
  
_I think you are right in that focusing on something immediate may help - I recently spoke to Lincoln, who mentioned how many different groups I was involved with in University and how all of that has fallen by the wayside since I have started working at IRC. I used to do so many extracurriculars - archery was my sport, which I am aware is an odd choice. Anya is to blame for that, she was watching YouTube videos in our dorm about shooting techniques when I first walked in… not the best of first impressions, but that’s Anya for you.  
_  
_I have emailed a local program for LGBT+ homeless youth (43% of homeless youth in D.C. are LGBT+, which is frighteningly high), and hope to get involved. I suppose I am also aware that I am not here to stay - there is so much to get involved with in IRC and it is interesting, but the problems are just so overwhelming that  
_  
**  
  
Lexa’s phone rings again as she’s half way through an answering letter, and her finger hovers over the red ignore button, wanting to finish it and get it sent out. It’s the third time Anya has called her today, though, so she sighs and drops her pen, picking up the phone.  
  
Her greeting is cut off by a brusque, taut, “I didn’t get in.”  
  
“To what?” Lexa asks, taking her phone away from her face to see the date. She doesn’t even have a chance to find it before Anya says, “To anything. I didn’t send the applications in.”  
  
Lexa is silent for a moment, absorbing that slowly. “Why?”  
  
“I couldn’t. Didn’t want to. Anyway, I wanted to let you know. You don’t need to edit anything else.”  
  
“What are you going to do?”  
  
“I don’t know,” Anya says, almost sounding relieved at the prospect. It’s the first real emotion she’s shown the entire phone call, her other words clipped and bland.  
  
“I- are you okay?”  
  
“No, Lexa. I’m not okay. I haven’t been okay since one of my best friends was killed in a car crash earlier this year. I haven’t been coping well. Maybe I’ll come back to do a postgrad later, maybe I won’t. The idea of further study at this point in my life no longer seems feasible. I thought I should tell you.”  
  
“Shit, Anya.” Lexa finds herself standing but she can't remember thinking to do it. Her hands are in her pocket as if to check for her keys before leaving the house. “Do you - should I-” she can’t get anything out of her mouth, her brain feeling frozen with the surprise of it.  
  
“It’s taken me a long time to realize that this just isn’t what I need or want right now, but I’m seeing a psychologist, and he’s helped me reach this decision. I’m happier now I’ve made it.”  
  
“You’re seeing a- how did I not know this?”  
  
“You’ve had enough of your own shit to be dealing with, you didn’t need mine as well.” She can hear it now - the nerves under Anya’s calm phrasing, and she sits back down slowly, searching for words.  
  
“Anya… I’m sorry. I’ve been so caught up in my own-- I almost forgot that she was your friend, too.”  
  
“I miss her,” Anya says simply. “I didn’t have anyone but you to talk about her, but I’ve been too worried about you to speak to you properly.”  
  
“I’m doing better now,” Lexa says, and for the first time it doesn’t feel like a lie.  
  
“You know,” Anya drawls, her tone dropping into something more relaxed, like she’d prepared a statement that she’d needed to get out and now that it was she could finally move on. “I almost believe you.”  
  
Lexa just breathes down the phone for a few moments. “I hate that I made you feel you were unable to speak to me. I _hate_ that.”  
  
“It’s okay, Lexa. It’s okay. You really weren’t able to deal with my shit. I found another way. That’s not on you. Don’t take it on yourself, please. You’ve been way too much of a mess.”  
  
“Offensive,” Lexa tells her, but she doesn’t dispute it. “Please just… I’m not such a mess that I can’t be your friend. Anymore, at least. I’m not making any promises that I won’t be a mess again tomorrow, but bad days are getting less frequent. I’ve been in my own selfish head for too long. Let me know what you need.”  
  
“Tell me that you don’t judge me for this, that’s all.” She says it with a blasé kind of drawl that makes Lexa smile, because Anya has never been able to be vulnerable without pretending it’s a joke.  
  
“You’re the smartest person I know. When I grow up I want to be you,” Lexa says. “Seriously, Anya. Degrees aren’t the end of the world. I’m sure whatever you do end up doing will be amazing. And if you need help getting there, and deciding where there is, please know that I’m here. Do you need me to get on a plane?”  
  
“Don’t be an idiot. Stop throwing your money around like an insane person.”  
  
Lexa rolls her eyes, and Anya clears her throat. “I’ve got to go. But thanks, Lexa.”  
  
“Anytime,” Lexa promises, and Anya hums like she knows Lexa means it, hanging up on her and leaving her to smile at the wall.  
  
Lexa looks back at her desk, blinking at a letter that now seems very out of date, crossing a line through the beginning and starting again.  
  
**  
_~~it is interesting, but the problems are just so overwhelming that~~_  
  
_I just had a phone call from Anya. I’ve been hanging up on her today because I thought I understood your letter. I went out and spent most of today trying to find someone to help, when Anya’s been right here needing my help and I haven’t been providing it._  
  
_I won’t go into the particulars because she is a private person and would hate for me to do so, but she’s been making some decisions about her future and I have been so involved in my own grief that I had forgotten about hers. Anya was one of Kostia’s best friends, Lincoln was essentially her brother, too. I think I almost forgot that. Anya told me that she understands I haven’t been in a place where I’ve been able to support her, but I think I need to start remembering other people have been affected too, and to stop thinking I’m in this alone._  
  
_It’s hard in D.C., I know very few people here and the impermanence makes it worse._  
  
_IRC does some incredible things, I really do believe in the organization as a whole. There are so many refugees hitting the shores of a country that’s embroiled too deeply in its own economic crisis to be able to give adequate aid, and IRC has just sent an emergency team there that has been sending back the most heartbreaking photographs. Anything that I can contribute to that is something that I have to do, even if it’s just short term and doesn’t feel like it’s ever going to be enough. I need to focus on that, and my friends.  
_  
_I can’t help anyone when I’m focused on my own grief. I need to find my way out of this. There’s too much to do. I may not make a great difference, but feeling like I’m making a difference isn’t the point, helping refugees or my friends to make myself feel better isn’t the point. I need to try.  
_  
_I’m not sure I like that it took my friend falling apart to make me remember the motivation behind choices I made long ago, but I feel more myself tonight than I have in a long time.  
_  
_Kos once told me she didn’t recognize me when I wasn’t furious about something I’d read in the newspaper that morning - she may not have been entirely wrong.  
_  
_A pediatric clinical trial sounds like a uniquely high emotion environment to be working in - I hope that you’ve been able to put into practice the steps your best friend gave to you. The small things do count, Clarke. Your letters may have been small to start out with, but I do not believe I would be able to have had that conversation with Anya and understand what she was going through if I hadn’t already been given your understanding, and a safe place to have been able to begin speaking about things I had been keeping to myself.  
_  
_Let me know how things are going there - I hope my newfound determination is contagious.  
_  
_Lexa  
_  
**  
  
**Subject** : i thought you missed my face  
**Date:** Thu August 13, 2015 at 2:13 AM  
**From:**  Wells Jaha <wellsjaha@nyu.edu>  
**To:** Clarke Griffin  <clarke.griffin@mit.edu>  
  
Hey stranger,  
  
Now that I’m back in the States and flying to me is only going to be a hundred bucks, what say you take a weekend off and come see an old friend?   
  
I know you’re going to try and cite your heavy workload as an excuse to avoid me but I have an extra desk in my apartment and perfectly good wifi. I even have a new color printer that you can print papers with so really, there’s no excuse.  
  
Let me know. I’ll air out the futon and break out the Febreze for you. And by you I mean me because you’re the one that smells.  
  
Love ya,  
  
Wells  
  
**Wells Jaha, B.A (International Relations)**  
Hauser Global Scholar, New York University Law  
Chair, Political Action Committee, Black Allied Law Student Association, NYU Chapter  
Co-Advocacy Chair, Law Students for Human Rights, NYU Chapter  
  


**

_August 15, 2015_

_Dear Lexa,  
_  
_First of all, I just wanted to say how proud I am of you for reaching out and trying to engage in the things happening in your community. I really admire that you are the kind of person who is known for being passionate and proactive, and I think it’s amazing that you are striving to find that center in you again.  
_  
_The homeless LGBT+ youth numbers are really frightening and I really wish things were different. Still, that wish is useless until actions are put to it so I can only say that I am so proud of you for stepping in and stepping up, and I will try to look into the opportunities that are available here so I can try to make a difference too. And speaking of pride, can I just say it’s very reassuring to have someone like you working for ~~the LGBT+ community~~ ~~these kids~~ us. I look forward to hearing about the successes of your endeavors, Lexa Natron.  
_  
_I am sorry to hear that Anya is having a rough time. I hope that she’s doing better. Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help? I don’t want to overstep and she definitely doesn’t need to share anything she doesn’t want to but please let her know that she has people and if she would like, I would like to help in any small way, too. It’s easy to get wrapped in the vortex of one’s own life (God knows I have been guilty of that recently) but it’s important and essential to step back and look at the people around us, especially those closest to us. Anya is lucky to have a friend like you. I’m glad that you’re slowly starting to come to terms with what has happened and that you can continue coming to terms with it with the people who love you. Another thing to be proud of!  
_  
_While it’s fantastic that you’ve begun sorting through the things you want to do and the things you feel you’re capable of, please make sure you’re not just pushing your grief to the side and burying it with things like work. I have definitely gone that route before and it doesn’t work - I don’t want to see you go through it either. Keep looking forward and doing great things, but remember that I’m here and Anya and Lincoln and everyone else and if you ever need someone to talk to or you ever want to share something, don’t ever hesitate. You can’t help anyone if you’re focused on your own grief, yes, but you also can’t help anyone if you’re not helping yourself. My mother likes to remind me of that often.  
_  
_Thanks for sharing your determination. You should give yourself some credit - I think you would be able to have that conversation with Anya without having heard from me but I’m pleased that I’ve been able to help. I’ll let you know how things with the clinical trial work out (I’m considering staying on through the school year) but in the meantime, let’s both stay focused and strong and positive! I think we’ve gotten off to a great start anyway.  
_  
_Looking forward to hearing from you,  
_  
_Clarke  
_  
_P.S: This was not the way I thought I would be telling you this but since it’s in here I guess I should clarify that when I said ‘us’, I meant I am bi. ~~So it’s us because I am in the community too and~~ Just thought I should make sure that was clear.  
_  
_P.P.S: Bi-Bi!  
_  
**  
  
Clarke resists the urge to cross out the last postscript, maybe just throw the whole letter away. She hasn’t been this awkward about her sexuality since that first talk with her mother, a mess of trying to explain that there may be a girl, that it was _not_ Raven, that it didn’t mean she didn’t like boys. Still, it’s better this than accidentally saying something strange if she were to ever see Lexa face to face again.  
  
(Something like _you look beautiful_ in a way that can’t be anything but an unwelcome desire.)  
  
Clarke seals the envelope and slips it in her bag. She tries not to think about why Lexa is the one to make her nervous, instead focuses on the fact that any awkwardness is better than saying nothing at all, especially for a friendship that has been built on an openness that is still surprising.  
  
**

**Lexa Natron**  
Text Message  
2015-08-15 4:05 PM

I just wanted to say that I regretted that  
postscript as soon as I wrote it but I figured  
it might be a source of amusement for you.  
I guess you now have something to look forward to...

  
I always look forward to your letters, Clarke.

2015-08-20 10:05 AM

No need for regret - although you should  
probably forego any idea of a career in  
stand-up comedy. Puns are not your friend.

**  
  
“Clarke! Clarke!”  
  
“Hey, buddy.”  
  
Clarke leans down and lets small arms wrap around her neck. A soft down of hair brushes her cheek as she pulls back and she smiles, runs gentle fingers over the dark brown fuzz and laughs at the way the head beneath it wiggles.  
  
“Growing in real nice, Ameera. Soon you won’t be able to see, you’ll have so much hair.”  
  
“I can't wait!” the little girl grins. She runs her own small hands over her head again and again, laughing as Clarke raises an eyebrow at her. “I want to have braids and tie it up and go crazy. My mom already told me I could do anything I wanted once it grows back.”  
  
“Just don’t dye it pink.”  
  
“I might dye it pink,” Ameera says. “I might dye it rainbow. Mom said _anything._ ”  
  
Clarke laughs and listens to Ameera chatter excitedly at her. By the time she’s finished her round of the room - tidying Ameera’s meager stack of books on her bedside table, adjusting the flowers left by the windowsill, checking that Ameera has enough blankets draped over her tiny frame - Ameera has settled with a happy sigh, dark eyes twinkling against the pale white of the pillowcase.  
  
“Can you sit with me, Clarke?”  
  
Clarke checks the clock on the bedside table before nodding, moves to hoist herself up onto bed where Ameera has shuffled over to make space. She almost immediately jumps back down again when she lands on something hard, and Ameera watches with a quizzical look as Clarke winces and pulls out her phone from her back pocket.  
  
“Forgot to put this in my locker,” Clarke mumbles, only to bark out a surprised, “Hey!” when Ameera swipes it from her.  
  
“Let’s take a selfie,” Ameera says with a grin. She’s wiggled out from the blankets and down towards the end of the bed to get away from Clarke’s reach, not that Clarke is trying very hard. The memory of Ameera’s tears, throat rasped raw from screaming as Dr. Tsing had inserted the needle is still fresh and Clarke can’t bear to think of it for too long, not when Ameera is smiling so brightly at her, phone held up haphazardly in front of them.  
  
“Smile!” Ameera cheers just as Clarke opens her mouth to tell her she needs to hold the phone up higher. She can only laugh when Ameera says, “Cheese!” and takes another picture.  
  
Later, after her shift ends and Clarke has a chance to thumb through the dozens of trigger-happy photos Ameera had taken, she finds one that looks a mirror to the one she had sent Lexa - Ameera, focused and happy in front, Clarke in mid-exclamation behind her. She smiles to herself, sets it as her phone background and gets off at the stop closest to the drugstore with the photo printing booth, note already writing itself.  
  
**  
  
A photo slips out of the envelope and Lexa peers inside it as if she expects there to be a very slim piece of paper with words on it. It appears that the photo is all Clarke has sent, but familiar handwriting scrawls on the back: _‘A selfie one of my patients decided was necessary - I thought you should have something a little more recent’_.  
  
She flips it over, blinking at the width of Clarke’s grin. The kid next to her is skinny, a weak fuzz covering her scalp. Summer has spattered freckles Lexa doesn’t remember across Clarke’s nose, and she looks like she’s partway through saying something to the kid holding the camera, lips half open and cheeks dimpled in a laughter that darkens her eyes.  
  
Lexa puts the photo down on her desk carefully, propping it up against the wall and wheeling her chair back from it, staring at the creasing in the corners of Clarke’s eyes, the sweep of fine hair across her brow, mouth open in a way that shouldn’t be-

Her own mouth rounds with the only word that she can manage.

_Oh._


End file.
